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THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

REV. JOHN ROACH STRATON, D.D. 



THE 
GARDENS OF LIFE 

Messages of Cheer 
and Comfort 

BY 



REV. JOHN ROACH STRATON, D.D. 

PASTOR OF CALVARY BAPTIST CHURCH, 
NEW YORK CITY 

Author oj ^^The Menace of Immorality y' etc. 




NEW ^S^ YORK 
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 






COPYRIGHT, 1921, 
BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 



PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

©CI.A622601 



DEDICATION 

AS A SLIGHT TOKEN OF ESTEEM AND A SIMPLE EX- 
PRESSION OF APPRECIATION FOR RARE QUALITIES 
OF MIND AND HEART, I DEDICATE THIS BOOK TO 
MY FRIEND AND COMRADE IN CHRISTIAN SERVICE 

EDWARD C. MILLER 

ONE OF NEW YORK'S BUSINESS MEN WHO HAS 
WON A WORTHY SUCCESS AND THROUGH SERVING 
THE BLESSED MASTER HAS FOUND THE JOYFUL 
SECRET OF HAPPINESS IN THE GARDENS OF LIFE 



PREFACE 

Feeling that the time was ripe for some uncom- 
promising messages on the shortcomings of the church 
and the awful sins of modem society, as seen in the 
light of the sterner warning of God's Word, I prepared 
for pubhcation a book of sermons under the general sub- 
ject, ''The Menace of ImmoraHty in Church and State 
— Messages of Wrath and Judgment." 

This book was published by George H. Doran Com- 
pany. It has gone through several editions and seems to 
be accompHshing its mission. 

Realizing the need of encouragement to many in this 
time of storm and stress in human society, I am led now 
to send out the group of sermons embodied in this book 
as Messages of Cheer and Comfort. 

These sermons were stenographically reported and they 
are printed just as they were delivered. I have not made 
any attempt to smooth them down or reduce them to a 
fine literary form, as I hope that the rugged simpHcities 
of extemporaneous speech may cause them to be more 
effective. They are sent out in the prayerful and humble 
hope that they may bring Cheer and Inspiration to many 

hearts. 

John Roach Straton. 
Study of 

Calvary Baptist Church, 

New York City. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Gardens of Life . 13 

II. The Condition of Discipleship .^ . . 26 

III. Daily Strength for Daily Needs . . . 36 

IV. The Bitter and the Sweet of Life ... 42 

V. The Blessed Shadow 50 

VI. The Meaning of Christ's Coming into the 

World 65 

VII. The Miracle and the Meaning of the 

Transfiguration 83 

VIII. Did Jesus Arise from the Dead? .... 98 

IX. The Only Way Out from All Our 

Troubles 108 

X. Who Is God? 119 

XI. Building the Temple ; or God's Call to His 

Church To-day 138 

XII. The Transforming Power of the Christ . 150 

XIII. The World's Cry and Christ's Command . 163 

XIV. The Law of Prayer 183 

XV. The Gospel of the Holy Spirit .... 201 

XVI. Are the New Hea\^ns and the New 

Earth Near at Hand? 214 

XVII. Will We Know Our Loved Ones in 

Heaven? ^ 233 

ix 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 



THREE GARDENS 



THE GARDEN OF EDEN 

"And the Lord God took the 
man, and put him into the garden 
of Eden to dress it and to keep it. 

''And the Lord God commanded 
the man, saying, Of every tree of 
the garden thou mayest freely eat : 

"But of the tree of the knowledge 
of good and evil, thou shalt not 
eat of it : for in the day that thou 
eatest thereof thou shalt surely 
die. . . . 

"And when the woman saw that 
the tree was good for food, and that 
it was pleasant to the eyes, and a 
tree to be desired to make one wise, 
she took of the fruit thereof, and 
did eat, and gave also unto her hus- 
band with her ; and he did eat. 

"And the eyes of them both were 
opened, and they knew that they 
were naked ; and they sewed fig 
leaves together, and made them- 
selves aprons. 

"And they heard the voice of the 
Lord God walking in the garden in 
the cool of the day : and Adam and 
his wife hid themselves from the 
presence of the Lord God amongst 
the trees of the garden." 

—Genesis 2 : 15-17 and 3 :6-8. 



THE GARDEN OF GETHSE- 
MANE 

"Then cometh Jesus with them 
unto a place called Gethsemane, 
and saith unto the disciples, Sit 
ye here, while 1 go and pray yonder. 

"Then saith he unto them, My 
soul is exceeding sorrowful, evea 
unto death : tarry ye here, and 
watch with me. 

"And he went a little further, 
and fell on his face, and prayed, 
saying, O my Father, if it be pos- 
sible, let this cup pass from me: 
nevertheless, not as I will, but as 
thou loilt. 

"And he cometh unto the dis- 
ciples, and findeth them asleep, and 
saith unto Peter, What, could ye 
not watch with me one hour? 

"And while he yet spake, lo, 
Judas, one of the twelve, came, 
and with him a great multitude 
with swords and staves, from the 
chief priests and elders of the 
people." 

—Matthew 26 :36, 38-40, and 47. 



THE RESURRECTION GARDEN 

"Now in the place where he was crucified 
there was a garden ; and in the garden a new 
sepulchre, wherein was never man yet laid. 

"There laid they Jesus therefore because of 
the Jews' preparation day; for the sepulchre 
was nigh at hand. 

"But Mary stood without at the sepulchre 
weeping : and as she wept, she stooped down, 
and looked into the sepulchre. 

"And seeth two angels in white sitting, the 
one at the head, and the other at the feet, 
where the body of Jesus had lain. 

"And they say unto her, Woman, why weep- 
est thou? She saith unto them, Because they 
have taken away my Lord, and I know not 
where they have laid him. 

"And when she had thus said, she turned her- 
self back, and saw Jesus standing." 

—John 19:41-42 and 20:11-14. 



i 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

CHAPTER I 

THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Scripture Reading: Gen. 2:15-17, 3:6-8, Matt. 26:36-46, John 
19:41-42, 20:15. 

Gardens have played a large part in human life. The 
very word itself is musical and fascinating. It suggests 
to us cool retreats and blooming flowers and the melody 
of singing birds, and golden sunlight, rippling on green 
grasses and sparkling upon limpid lakes. 

The Bible makes clear the interesting fact that three 
of the great pivotal events of the world's history took 
place in gardens. 

First of all, the creation and the fall of man occurred 
in a garden. It is written in Genesis that ^'God took 
the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it 
and to keep it.'' There are several very illuminating 
truths in this brief verse of Scripture. The first is that 
God's ideal dwelling place for man is a garden. Not a 
desert, nor a bleak mountain height, and not the drab 
streets of a squalid city, but a place of beauty and bloom 
was the home that God made for man. 

And here in this spot of beauty, God walked and talked 
with man. The plan of a loving Creator was to have an 

13 



14 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

intimacy of communion and fellowship between the 
Creator and His creatures ; and when God's great plans 
for man's happiness and peace are finally worked out in 
*'the fulness of the times," it will be true once more 
that *'God will dwell with them and be their God, and 
God will wipe away all tears from their eyes.'' 

We also learn from this Scripture that God designed 
man to be a worker. There is a very foolish notion 
abroad, to the effect that labor has come about only 
because of the curse of sin, that labor is a part of the 
punishment that a righteous God inflicted upon a re- 
bellious race. There could not be a grosser or more 
pernicious error than this. Labor is a blessing and not 
a curse, and it is made very plain in the Scripture that 
before ever man was tempted to his fall, and before 
ever sin entered to blight and blast the race, 'God put 
the man into the garden of Eden to dress it and to 
keep it/' 

There was useful labor, therefore, in the plan of God 
from the very beginning. Sin did take the joy from 
labor, in part; and yet in the good wisdom and the lov- 
ing kindness of God, honest toil was designed as a part 
of the natural heritage of man, and the race will make 
a long step back toward the lost Eden, toward happiness 
and peace, when all men everywhere work. The New 
Testament joins the Old in saying that, ''If a man will 
not work, neither shall he eat," and untold blessings 
would come to us all if the drones at both extremes of 
our society were completely eliminated. The idle rich 
and the loafing poor alike are offensive in the sight of 
God, and are a menace to the best interests of man. 

Yes, God's ideal home for man is a garden, and God's 
ideal man is a worker; and the utmost of heavenly wis- 
dom was manifested when God put the man in the garden 
of Eden *'to dress it and to keep it.'' 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 15 

THE FALL IN A GARDEN 

But it IS a tragic and terrible fact that even into the 
beauty of Eden, the serpent entered and man fell, de- 
spite the glory of the bright home that a good God had 
given him. 

And still it is true, my friends, that the devil comes 
even into our gardens to mar our happiness and to lead 
us astray. We saw that illustrated in the case of the 
former German empire. The most prosperous, the most 
peaceful, the best educated, the most highly cultured 
people, in many respects, upon the earth were the Ger- 
mans, and yet even into that garden, the devil of false 
ambition and selfishness entered to tempt the leaders of 
the empire to their fall, and through them to change a 
world that was smiling with peace into a welter of woe 
and a slaughterhouse of shame. 

There are some who are saying to-day that if we will 
only make a good environment the human race will ulti- 
mately come back into righteousness and truth. Environ- 
ment does undoubtedly exercise some influence, but there 
is a deeper factor still in the problem of righteousness, 
and that is the human heart which, according to Script- 
ure, is ''deceitful above all things and desperately 
wicked." 

A MEETING WITH ANARCHISTS 

I can never forget an experience I had during my pas- 
torate in the city of Chicago. There had been an epi- 
demic of crime in the city, and a great mass meeting 
was called by the socialists, anarchists and other 'lib- 
erals" of the community to discuss the causes of the 
crime wave and a possible remedy for it. They invited 
a professor of the University of Chicago to speak. They 



1 6 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

had also a well-known judge to discuss the question from 
the legal standpoint, a ''liberar' preacher to give his ideas 
on the causes and cure for crime, and a prominent social- 
ist to give his remedies. 

I was invited to speak on this subject from the stand- 
point of orthodox Christianity. It was a very interest- 
ing occasion. A great crowd gathered that packed the 
house v/ith a mass of humanity, reaching all the way 
from the ''intellectuals" among the socialists, down to the 
most rabid anarchists. Mine was the closing address of 
the evening, and I followed the socialist orator. His 
great argument was that crime was the result of bad 
environment; that if we would wipe out the inequalities 
and injustices of modern life, and have a fair, square 
division of wealth and an equal opportunity for every- 
body, — that if we would have sanitary homes and plenty 
to eat and good clothes, and the other things that money 
can buy for all the people, — crime would disappear and 
an ideal society would spring up. 

I followed this speech with an uncompromising procla- 
mation of the Bible doctrine of sin and rebellion against 
God as the real secret of all disorder and the true source 
of all vice and crime. It happened that just at that very 
time the insurance scandals, which so stirred the nation 
a few years ago, were being discussed from one end 
of the continent to the other. The very day of that 
mass meeting, the papers were full of the sad and sorry 
story of the defalcation and misdoing of the president 
of one of the largest insurance companies in this country. 
The facts were brought out that he had used the money 
of the company for his own personal ends. So, holding 
the newspaper that contained these facts in my hand, I 
pointed out to that great crowd that here was a man 
who had a magnificent home and all the luxuries and 
comforts that money could buy, who moved in the best 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 17 

social circles, who was a graduate of one of the leading 
schools of the country, but who had proven himself a 
criminal despite his ideal environment! As I frankly 
put it, he was ''rotten at heart, and that was the key 
to all of his wrongdoing." I told them without flinch- 
ing, that ''out of the heart are the issues of life,'' and 
that until a man's heart is right with God and his fellows- 
men, it makes no difference what his environment is, 
he will be a rascal still! 

Some, I am glad to say, received the truth from God's 
Word which I gave them that night, though others were 
in open rebelhon against me. When, at the close of my 
address, I made an appeal for the old faith upon which 
the best of our Anglo-Saxon ci\'ilization is founded, 
and then closed with a tribute to the glorious flag of our 
coimtry, a group of anarchists in the meeting — men and 
women — sprang to their feet, screaming like tigers : 
"Down with the flag! Damn the flag! And down with 
the God behind the flag!'' 

And that is precisely the logical and final result of 
the foolish talk of which we hear so miuch to-day. That 
is what it leads us to. It is not only "down with the 
flag," but "down with the God behind the flag." There 
is rank injustice and there are entrenched wrongs, against 
which we do well to battle; but our American nation 
needs to learn the stern and terrible truth that not even 
a garden will save us, if our hearts are wrong. For, 
once more be it said, the fall of man came in a garden, 
just conceived by Almiighty Wisdom, and just created 
by Omnipotent Power! And even in the perfect en- 
vironment of Heaven, the devil, through false pride 
and overweening ambition, rebelled against God and fell 
into sin. 



1 8 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

REDEMPTION IN A GARDEN 

A second pivotal event in the history of humanity 
was the redemption of the race, which was wrought out 
by Christ in a garden. There is no more touching or 
tender page in all of Scripture than those chapters which 
picture the agony of our Master in the garden of Geth- 
semane. There the sorrows and the sins of a fallen race, 
all the way from Eden down to the last moment of re- 
corded time, were heaped upon Him.; and in that dark 
hour. He drained to its dregs the bitter cup of human 
folly and rebellion against God. 

But there also, thank God, the wreck and ruin that 
came to Eden's garden was righted forever. For Geth- 
semane was essentially a part of Calvary. Christ really 
won the great fight for our redemption when He said in 
the Garden: ''Nevertheless not my will, but thine be 
done.'' It was there in the ''travail of his souF' that our 
redemption was wrought out. For "His soul was made 
an offering for sin." Ah, yes, we make a great mistake 
in thinking that it was only the suffering of His precious 
body upon the cross that purchased our salvation. 

The Southern poet, Sidney Lanier, has beautifully 
pictured this suffering of our Lord in the Garden, and 
he makes plain that there, when the face of God was 
averted from Him, and all human pity was withdrawn, 
when even His chosen disciples slept, "He tasted death 
for every man,'' and from under the trees of the Garden, 
He came "content" to suffer and to die for us: 

"Into the woods my Master went, 
Clean forspent, forspent. 
Into the woods my Master came, 
Forspent with love and shame ! 
But the oHves they were not Hind to Him, 
The little gray leaves were kind to Him, 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 19 

The thorn-tree had a mind to him, 
When into the woods He came. 

Out of the woods my ^Master w-ent, 

And He was well content. 

Out of the woods my Master came, 

Content with death and shame ! 

When Death and Shame would woo Him last. 

From under the trees they drew Him last, 

Twas on a tree they slew Him — last, 

When out of the woods He came." 

Yes, out from the shadow of those sympathetic trees 
of the sweet Garden, death and shame led him forth 
to bear our death and shame. 



NEW LIFE IN THE GARDEN 

But there is yet another pivotal event in the history 
of humanity which occurred in a garden, and that is the 
resurrection of our Lord. Very beautifully is it writ- 
ten : ''Now in the place where he was crucified there was 
a garden; and in the garden a new sepulchre, wherein 
was never man yet laid. There laid they Jesus.'' (John 
19:41-42.) It is a very touching and significant fact 
that we have always had a natural impulse to bury our 
beloved dead in some spot of beauty; and Joseph's tomb 
in the garden was a fitting place in which the wounded 
body of the Son of God should find its brief repose 
in the cold embrace of death. 

Nature was ever good to Christ, for He was ever de- 
voted to her. The Lord of nature w^as also a lover of 
nature, and in the time of His extreme agony, therefore, 
it is not surprising that the sun hid its face, and the 
very earth quaked with sympathy and horror at the enor- 
mity of that crime, when the sinful sons of men killed 



20 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

the sinless Son of God. And I have loved to think that 
upon that Sabbath morning, when the women came to 
bedew the cold gray stones with their tears, and to lay- 
there the flowery tribute of their love, the birds were 
singing a little more sweetly than anywhere else upon 
earth, and the blossoms were smiling to the skies with a 
brighter beauty because they were watching over the 
tomb of the Lord of life. 

And there in that place of fragrant quiet, in the solemn 
charm of the garden, Christ arose, and the final victory 
over death and the grave was won. There God Almighty 
put His seal of acceptance upon the Master's finished 
work on the cross by raising Him from the dead. There 
the correction of the ruin from the first garden was fully 
completed, and a new and better Eden was made possible 
for all the children of men. There in the garden, He 
was ''offered up for our offenses and raised again for 
our justification." 



A GARDEN OF EDEN IN EVERY LIFE 

And now, my friends, it remains only to be said that 
these three gardens, at which we have looked, have their 
counterpart in human experience to-day. 

Childhood is our Eden. There we know none of the 
cares that later in life eat like cankers at the heart. There 
in the freedom and the joyful gladness of childhood, God 
gives each one of us a little touch of His original para- 
dise, and a little foretaste of that happy estate that is 
coming hereafter to the redeemed children of men. The 
sweetest time of a human life is found in those bright 
and blessed days of childish innocence, peace and joy. 
James Whitcomb Riley, in his great wealth of human 
understanding and sympathy, has fittingly expressed 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 21 

somewhat of the beauty and charm of that magic time 
when he says : 

'^Oh, the days gone by, the days gone by ! 

The apples in the orchard, and the pathway through the 
rye! 

The chirrup of the robin, and the whistle of the quail, 

As he piped across the meadows, sweet as any night- 
ingale ! 

When the bloom was on the clover, and the blue was in 
the sky, 

And our happy hearts brimmed over, in the days gone by ! 

In the days gone by, when our naked feet were tripped, 
By the honeysuckle tangle, w^here the waterlilies dipped, 
And the ripples of the river washed the moss along the 

brink. 
Where the dreamy-eyed and lazy- footed cattle came to 

drink ; 
And the tilting snipe stood fearless of the truant's way- 
ward cry. 
And the splashing of the swimmer, in the days gone by. 

Oh, the days gone by, oh, the days gone by! 
The music on the laughing lip, the luster in the eye, • 
The childish faith in fairies and Aladdin's magic ring. 
The simple, soul reposing, glad belief in everything. 
When life was like a story, holding neither sob nor sigh, 
In the olden, golden glory of the days gone by!" 

Yes, childhood is an Eden, and surely it is a happy, 
sin-free, blessed time! One of the greatest tragedies of 
earthly life, to my thinking, is the loss of childhood's 
privileges by many of the little people of to-day. Oh, 
may God forgive us that in our greed for gold and our 
passion for pleasure we have trampled the hearts of little 
children, and denied to them the privileges of Eden's 



22 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

childhood through our commercialism and lust for gain! 

But while childhood is an Eden, the sad fact confronts 
us that into our Eden also the serpent comes. I know 
not, my friends, what you may think about the story 
related in the early chapters of Genesis, but there is one 
fact that we cannot escape, and that is that there is a 
garden of Eden in every human heart and every human 
life. The time comes to each of us when we reach the 
years of moral accountability, when before us the mo- 
mentous issues of obedience or rebellion stand; when 
the two roads stretch out before us — the road of trust 
and righteousness, and the road of disobedience and sin. 
And the terrible, tragic, heart-breaking fact of all human 
life is that the day finally comes when every son of 
Adam takes the wrong road! There has only been one 
sinless life that has adorned the walks of men, and that 
was the life of Jesus, the Son of Man and the Son of 
God. 

Yes, to all of us the experience of disobedience and 
rebellion and sin comes, and with it the anguish and the 
agony of a ruined Eden. And with that, too, comes the 
inexorable voice of God demanding an account of our 
stewardship, and the driving out from that place of inno- 
cence and peace, and the fiery sword that guards forever 
the entrance gate ! 

OUR GETHSEMANES 

Because of these things, too, there comes to each one 
of us an experience in our own life of the garden of 
Gethsemane. Every one, soon or late, must pass beneath 
the trees of the garden and suffer there alone. It may 
be the Gethsemane of bitter struggle and grinding pov- 
erty and corroding care. It may be disease and pain 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 23 

and weary sickness. It may be the long iare\vells that 
break our hearts beside the deathbeds of those whom we 
love more dearly than life itself. It may be the Geth- 
semane of remorse and of well-nigh despair over the sins 
that we say we cannot, but which in reality we v^'ill not, 
overcome. But acrcss each hum.an heart, the shadows of 
Gethsemane fail and to even.- lip the bitter cup soon or 
late is pressed. 

How can we m^eet these agonies of life? How can 
we struggle against these experiences that wring our 
souls? Ah, how I rejoice in this hour that I can say 
that there is a way of relief, that there is a "balm in 
Gilead." For there is also a resurrection garden for 
us all. 



**Come ye disconsolate I Where'er ye languish, 
Come to the mercy seat, fervently kneel. 
Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish ! 
Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal/'' 



THE RESURRECTIOX LIFE 

Yes, the crowning glor\' of God's truth is that a resur- 
rection life is possible to each and all of us here and 
now. When Jesus stepped forth as victor over death 
and the grave, He became our liznng Saviour, and 
through the vital tmion of faith with Him, we can enter 
into the richest treasures of His eternal Being. For we 
need to remember that there is a resurrection life pos- 
sible in this present world. Xot m.erely are our bodies to 
be requickened in that blessed coming time that follows 
death, but even in these walks of earth, through the 
power of a living Savior, we can enter into the richest 
treasures of the resurrection. It is written that "if we 



24 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

be risen with Him, we should seek those things that 
are above/' It is wTitten again that we are to walk ''in 
newness of life/' when in baptism we have emerged from 
the watery grave, in striking symbolism of His death, 
burial and resurrection. 

There is a way of victory, thank God, over every sin 
and every sorrow, and it lies along that pathway w^hich 
leads across the dark hill of Golgotha, and down into 
the shining valley of the empty tomb. We cannot, in 
the limitations and weakness of the flesh, escape the 
tempter who comes into our Eden and mars and ruins it 
and leads us into sin. We cannot avoid the shadows 
of Gethsemane, and the grief that there falls upon 
our hearts ; but, thank God, we can rise as victors above 
them both, in the power of a resurrection life, through 
Christ Jesus our Blessed Lord, unto whom be honor 
and praise and glory forever ! 

PARADISE REGAINED 

There is one other closing thought that these blessed 
truths from the Word of God may bring to our minds 
and hearts, and it is this : When we do pass up through 
the rebellion of Eden and the sorrows of Gethsemane 
into the new resurrection life ''in Christ Jesus," we 
can then look beyond all of this to the eternal joy which 
shall be ours in the paradise of God forever! 

In the wisdom and the power of God, His great Eden 
plan is to be finally worked out to full victory and per- 
fect blessedness. And in "a new heaven and a new 
earth,'' from which sin has been blotted, and from which 
the devil, the great deceiver and betrayer, has been cast 
out forever, once more humanity will walk and talk with 
God. Very quaintly and very truly has David Grayson 
phrased it, in that lovely little verse : 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 25 

*'A garden is a lovesome thing, 
God wot ! 
Rose plot, 
Fringed pool, 
Ferned grot — 

The veriest school of peace; and yet 
The fool 

Contends that God is not — 
Not God! in gardens? When the even is cool? 
Nay but I have a sign, 
Tis very sure God walks in mine!'' 

Yes, we have little foretastes of God and the sweet- 
ness of communion with Him, in the quiet of the evening 
hour or the purple splendor of the dawn, amid the fra- 
grant beauty of our gardens. But this is but the faintest 
foretaste of that ecstasy of fellowship which will come 
to us, when through the redeeming grace of Jesus Christ, 
fully reconciled to our Havenly Father, we shall serve 
Him with unending joy, and walk and talk with our 
Redeemer in the Garden of God forever! 



CHAPTER II 
THE CONDITION OF DISCIPLESHIP 

Text : "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself and 
take up his cross and follow me." (Matt. 16:24.) 

This text sets forth the condition of discipleship but 
not the way of salvation. The means of salvation are 
clearly given in Scripture, as repentance for sin and faith 
in the Lord Jesus Christ. The text sets before us the 
proof of discipleship only, though its conditions consti- 
tute the test of salvation. 

The meeting with the Pharisees and the Sadducees, re- 
counted in the earlier verses of this chapter, was fol- 
lowed by the dialogue between Jesus and His disciples 
concerning His deity. With a flash of heavenly insight, 
Peter had confessed, *Thou art the Son of the living 
God." But almost in the next breath this same Peter, 
who had had a revelation from heaven, fell under the 
influence of the spirit of evil, and Jesus had to rebuke 
him, saying, ''Get thee behind me, Satan!'' 

So Jesus saw the necessity of teaching them the true 
conception of discipleship. He here entered into this 
new teaching*, using Himself by way of illustration. 
''From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his 
disciples how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and sufifer 
many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, 
and be killed, and be raised again the third day.'' (Matt. 
16:21.) They could not understand this teaching, — the 
divine Messiah, just fully revealed, crucified! And it 

26 



THE CONDITION OF DISCIPLESHIP 27 

was because of Peter's demurring to this teaching that 
Jesus rebuked him, and then He said unto them, in prac- 
tical effect, ''Xot only must I bear the cross and die, but 
you also — all of my human followers — must pass through 
a like experience. If any man will come after me let 
him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.'' 

DENYING SELF 

The first condition, then, of discipleship as laid down 
here, is denying self. What does this mean? It does 
not mean what we call ''self-denial/' Self-denial may 
really minister to self. If we are to practice self-denial 
for a period of time, or during a whole season, to the 
end that we may with better conscience enjoy the pleas- 
ures of this world for the remainder of the year, then 
such self-denial is positively vicious. 

No, denying self is infinitely deeper than that. It 
means literally the dethroning of self. What is self? 
Self is the essence of personality. Self is the true man 
of the inner nature. There are three elements in a 
human personality, the judgment, the affections, and the 
will. The judgment approves the things that we ac- 
cept; the aft'ections clamor for the things we desire; and 
the will is that royal power which says to the judg- 
ment ''you shall have the thing you can approve," and 
to the aft'ections "you shall be given the things you 
desire." 

The sum total of these forces, then, is self, and 
Jesus says here to us that this self must be denied. 
That means that we must say "No" to self, in order 
that we may say "Yes" to Christ. It means that we 
must enlighten our human judgment by divine truth; 
that we must set our affections on things in heaven, not 
upon things upon the earth; and that we must bow 



2 8 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

our wills to God's will. It means, in a word, that our 
human natures must abdicate the throne, in order that 
the Divine Nature may come in and * 'dwell richly in 
us'' both ''to will and to do of His good pleasure." 

It is apparent from this, therefore, that this utter- 
ance of Jesus cuts to the very quick. It goes down to 
the foundation. Now observe very carefully that Jesus 
did not say, "If any man will come after me, let him 
take up his cross and follow me." We hear a great 
deal of that sort of talk to-day. We are told that we 
must "follow Jesus as our example," that we must ask 
ourselves "what would Jesus do"? etc. And all of this 
merely skims the surface of the Christian life. How 
can we follow Jesus unless we have first denied self? 
No man can take up the cross until he has first denied 
himself. The divine nature must supplant the old hu- 
man nature, until we can say with Paul, "For me to 
live is Christ." Then the bearing of the cross will 
be a comparatively easy matter, and through the doing 
of duty, we will issue out into delight 

TWO ELEMENTS OF DENYING SELF 

It becomes evident, from these considerations, that 
really to follow Jesus and to be His true disciple means 
two things, at the lowest possible estimate. First, it 
means that we must give up for God. But, much deeper 
than that, it means that we must give up to God. Here, 
for example, is Abraham. God said to him, "Come out 
of thy father's house to the land that I will shew thee. 
Leave all of this wonderful civilization here in the 
Mesopotamian valley, — these comforts of your father's 
house, these rare fellowships with your friends and loved 
ones, — all of these soft luxuries and delights of living, 
leave them and follow me.'' 



THE CONDITION OF DISCIPLESHIP 29 

And Abraham obeyed God. We can im;agine the 
amazement of his worldly-minded neighbors and friends. 
We can imagine some boon companion saying to him, 
** What is this I hear ? Are you really going to leave us ? 
What is this wild-goose chase? They tell me that you 
are actually thinking of pulling out and leaving all of 
us and going out to the wilderness.'' 

And we can see the far-away look of the mystic 
in the eye of Abraham, and we can hear the tremor in 
his voice, that the men of the world could not under- 
stand, as he answered simply: ^'Yes, I am going out to 
the wilderness to find God." 

And thus Abraham gave up for God. Oh, but that 
was not all for Abraham! Yonder we see him again — ' 
an old man now — climbing the heights of Mt. Moriah. 
A bright, beautiful lad is by his side. The fagots for 
a sacrifice are under his arm, and a long knife is in his 
waistband. We can hear the little lad saying wonder- 
ingly, "My father, behold the fire and the wood, but 
where is the lamb for a burnt offering?" 

Ah, yes, where is the lamb? God was purging Abra- 
ham by fire. God had promised him that his seed should 
be like the stars of the heaven and like the sands of the 
seaside for multitude; and in his old age He had given 
him Isaac; and his heart had been flooded with the 
joy and the wonder of it all, — the realization that God 
was fulfilling His promises. 

But God had suddenly said unto him, "Take now thy 
son, thy only son, Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get 
thee into the land of Moriah, and offer him there for a 
burnt offering, upon one of the mounts which I will tell 
thee of" (Gen. 22:2). 

And as Abraham climbed that height he was saying 
"Yes" to God. He denied himself. His judgment was 
that that lad should live, for he saw no other way for 



30 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

the fulfillment of God's promise. His affection, like a 
strong floodtide, surged about that boy, for the very 
life of the old man was in the boy; and his will clamored 
and demanded that the boy should live. 

But God had said the opposite. And as Abraham 
climbed the height, he gave up to God. He had given 
up for God when he left his father's house; but now he 
denied himself, and took up his cross, and followed God ! 

Ah, yes, dear friends, the great truths of religion 
cut to the very heart. There is no middle ground, and 
there is no easy way out. The demand of Jesus Christ 
upon us is inexorable. And yet, through it, we issue 
out into glory and real happiness. 

We rejoice that God turned aside the stroke from Isaac, 
and restored him to Abraham, when He found that he 
was willing and that he had faith. But these two things 
He requires also of us — that we shall give up for God, 
which is easy, and that we shall give up to God, which 
is hard. 

GIVING UP AN ONLY DAUGHTER 

I have a dear friend, the editor of one of the great 
religious journals of our country, and he has an only 
daughter, — 3. most beautiful and brilliant young woman. 
She has every grace of body and every charm of mind. 
I have noticed in recent times that I never meet this 
friend without finding, soon or late, a little pensive 
element coming into the conversation, and that always 
he mentions, in some connection, the fact that Margaret 
is soon to be married and that she is marrying a mis- 
sionary — ^a splendid stalwart youth who served his coun- 
try with heroism in the great war, and who is now 
going to China to serve Jesus as a soldier of the Cross, — 



THE CONDITION OF DISCIPLESHIP 31 

and that he is to take this dear girl from my friend's 
home with him across those distant seas. 

The last time that I was wath this friend, once more 
the conversation came around to this matter which is 
much upon his heart, and he said to me : ''I heard the 
other day an incident that greatly interested me. A 
rich man was down on the water-front watching the 
departure of a great ocean liner. He was walking up 
and down the dock with a rather complacent air. He 
was joined by an acquaintance, who said to him, *You 
seem to be much pleased about something.' 'Yes,' said 
the rich man, 'I do feel unusually good to-day. Do 
you see that vessel just dropping out into the North 
River? WtW, I have on that vessel $10,000 worth of 
equipment for a hospital in China. I made that gift at 
the instance of a missionary friend. I am greatly pleased 
that I had the privilege of doing that, and I just came 
down to see the vessel safely off.' And then the friend 
said to him, 'Well, that is interesting, and I am glad 
you made that gift! But,' he said, 'you know, I also 
have a gift on that ship. My only daughter is on the 
vessel, going to China as a foreign missionary.' /\nd 
th@ rich man stopped and looked swiftly into his friend's 
eyes and then exclaimed, 'My God, man? I haven't given 
anything, have I?' " 

JESUS DEXYIXG SELF 

All through His life, Jesus denied Himself. He said 
''Xo" to self in every time of testing. Yonder upon 
the mount of temptation He refused to satisfy His 
physical hunger by the use of His divine power in 
turning the stones into bread. He said "No," when 
the devil appealed to His self. Yonder again. He stands 
before Pilate, and Pilate could not understand this 



32 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

strange young man. Pilate was full of the selfishness 
of Rome and the self-seeking of the practical politician, 
and he looked down in amazement at Christ, as He 
stood before the throne. He saw that Christ under- 
stood that, as ruler, he had the power of life or death 
over Him, and that a word from him would save His 
life. We can imagine Pilate's mental attitude: ''What 
does it mean, young man, that you make no defense, that 
you give no answer ? D'o you understand that I am the 
Roman ruler? I have the power of giving or taking 
your life. Come, now, what defense will you make?'' 
And Jesus answered never a word, because He had de- 
nied self and knew that His duty pointed Him to the 
cross as the Savior of the lost race! 

For yonder, under the dark trees of the Garden, the 
final fight had been won. In His human weakness Jesus 
prayed, ''If possible" — no stronger now than that! — "if 
possible, O Father, let this cup pass from me"; but very 
quickly and decisively he added then — even though His' 
soul was in "travail" and drops of bloody sweat stood 
upon His brow — "nevertheless not my will but Thin^ 
be done!" And there our Lord, in the final, supreme 
crisis, gave up for God and gave up to God. 

"Love took up the harp of life 
And smote on all its chords with might, 
Smote the chord of self that, trembling, 
Passed in music out of sight." 

So Jesus went from the Garden to the Cross, and 
from the cross to the rock-hewn tomb, and then out 
of the tomb to glory and His eternal crown ! 

For when we bear the cross in faithfulness, the crown 
always comes. And this is the joy of the Christian 
philosophy of life. We come up to the cross with our 



THE CONDITION OF DISCIPLESHIP 33 

human vision, and we look at it. There it Hes, for- 
bidding, rough, and cold, and we shrink from it. Oh, 
the horror of having these hands pierced with the cruel 
nails, driven into the palpitating flesh and through to 
the tough fiber of the wood beneath! And, oh, the 
shame and the misery! And, oh, the pain of the spear 
thrust through the quivering side! So we shrink from 
it in horror. And yet the wonder and the blessedness of 
it! A\'hen we pick up the cross, it is transformed into 
a ladder, and upon it we climb, and climb, and climb, 
away from the world, with its false delusions and se- 
ductions — we climb, and climb, and climb the heights to 
glory! 

CHRIST AND THE KEYS 

Yes, dear friends, this is the condition of discipleship ; 
and, better than that, it is also the only way to human 
happiness; and, better still, it is the way to heavenly 
glory, for the disciple is finallv to know the jov of his 
Lord! 

That beautiful story of the keys, which one dear child 
of God has told us, very sweetly brings the truth home 
to our hearts. He had had a dream, and in his dream 
Jesus came and knocked at his door. When he opened 
it, there stood his Lord. In surprise and some confu- 
sion. he exclaimed: ''Why, good-morning, dear Master!'^ 
And the blaster smiiled graciously upon him, and said, 
''I have come to see you." "Why, certainly. Lord, come 
in.^' And the Lord came in, and his host, in some agi- 
tation, glanced hurriedly at this corner and the other 
of the room, and to the center table to see that every- 
thing that ought not to be there was out of sight. 
Then the Master said to him : "But, perhaps, you do 
not understand — I have come to stav all the time.'' 



34 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

''Why, certainly, dear Lord, I am delighted," replied the 
man. *'Then,'' said Jesus, ''since I have come to stay all 
the time, I will want to come and go freely, and so 
I will ask you for the keys to the house." "Certainly, 
Lord, I will have a duplicate set made at once and turn 
them over to you," said the man, and so he did. 

But as Jesus took the keys and looked at them, He 
glanced swiftly at His host and said: "Well, I am sorry 
you cannot trust me — Good-bye!" and went walking 
swiftly away. But the man stopped him and said, "Mas- 
ter, wait! What is it? Why do you leave, dear Master?" 

And then Jesus flashed upon him one of those looks, 
such as Peter saw when he denied Him — a look, ten- 
der and yet terrible, as He said : "These are not all of 
the keys." ''Why, no. Master," said the man, "they are 
all, except the one key, the little key to my own secret 
drawer, where I keep my private papers and my personal 
affairs." "Yes," said Jesus, "that is true; and, as I 
said, I am sorry you cannot trust Me." And again 
He started walking away. But the man, running after 
Him once more, said, "Stop, Master! stop!" and rush- 
ing up, he extended his hand and said, "Here, dear Lord, 
is the old bunch of keysT 

"Oh, the bitter shame and sorrow, 
That a time could ever be 
When I let the Savior's pity 
Plead in vain, and proudly answered: 
'AH of self, and none of Thee.' 

Yet He found me : I beheld Him 
Bleeding on the accursed tree ; 
Heard Him pray, 'forgive them, Father/ 
And my wistful heart said faintly: 
'Some of self and some of Thee.' 



THE CONDITION OF DISCIPLESHIP 35 

Day by day, His tender mercy, 
Healing, helping, full and free. 
Sweet and strong, and oh, so patient, 
Brought me lower, while I whispered: 
^Less of self and more of Thee/ 

Higher than the highest heaven, 
Deeper than the deepest sea, 
Lord, Thy love at last has conquered, 
Grant me now my soul's desire, 
'None of self and all of Thee/ '' 



CHAPTER III 
DAILY STRENGTH FOR DAILY NEEDS 

Text: "As thy days, so shall thy strength be." (Deut. 33:25.) 

In all the Word of God, there are few promises 
sweeter than this. Three things are implied in this text. 
The first is that strength will be needed; the second that 
strength will be given, and the third that the strength 
thus given will be graduated according to our daily 
needs. 

The Bible is a very plain and practical book. It is 
always outspoken, and it never blinks the sterner facts 
of life. This outspoken honesty of the Old Book is 
one thing that commends it so strongly to the universal 
human heart. In keeping with this prevailing spirit of 
the Bible is the strong recognition of the fact that 
strength will be needed to live our human lives aright. 

For one thing, strength will be needed for the burden 
of practical tasks. There has never been an age in the 
world's history when men and women were more driven 
than they are to-day. Truly has Longfellow said, 

'*Labor with what zeal you will, something still remains 
undone ; 
Something uncompleted still, waits the rising of the sun. 

By the bedside, on the stair, at the threshold, near the 

gates. 
With its menace or its prayer, like a mendicant it w^its ; 

36 



DAILY STRENGTH FOR DAILY NEEDS 37 

Waits, and will not go away; waits, and will not be 

gainsaid : 
By the cares of yesterday, each to-day is heavier made; 

Till at length the burden seems greater than our 
strength can bear; 

Heavy as the weight of dreams, pressing on us every- 
where. 

And we stand from day to day, like the dwarfs of times 

gone by, 
Who, as Northern legends say, on their shoulders held 

the sky/' 

I stood one morning at the end of Brooklyn Bridge, 
watching the working girls crossing over, in the early 
hours, from Brooklyn to Manhattan. Here they came, 
a long, and, to the thoughtful eye, a somewhat dreary 
procession. The cars were loaded with them. Many 
were walking the long distance over because they could 
not afford the five-cent carfare. Some of those dear 
children were eating their breakfasts as they hurried 
along. A simple sandwich in their hands and the look 
of haste in their eyes, as they rushed to meet the de- 
mands of the new day! My heart went out to them 
with a great compassion. Never before have business 
men, and women in the home, and this great army of 
working girls, had such burdens to bear as they have to- 
day; and surely strength is needed for these imperious 
tasks. 

Then, again, strength will be needed to meet the 
mysteries of suffering. Truly does the Bible say, ''In 
this world ye have tribulation.'' In one form or another, 
it comes to all of the children of men. In this age 
there are more broken hearts and bowed forms and per- 
plexed minds than ever before in the long sad history 



38 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

of sinful man upon this planet; and strength, therefore, 
is needed, if despair is not to engulf the individual and 
the race. 

STRENGTH WILL BE GIVEN 

How cheering is the fact that this strength will be 
given! How blessed and comforting the truth that we 
have a Helper, for one thing, who knows our needs; 
and, for another thing, who has the power to satisfy 
those needs. Jesus said, ^^Your Heavenly Father know- 
eth that ye have need of all these things.'' (Matt. 6 132.) 
And we also are taught that God is able to ''supply all 
your need according to his riches in glory by Christ 
Jesus.'' (Phil. 4:19.) 

There is a story of a young woman — a relative of 
Ruskin — who had been given by a friend of hers a m.ost 
beautiful silk handkerchief. By accident she overturned 
the ink pot on it, as it lay on the table, and soiled a 
good part of it. She wept until her heart literally ached 
when she thought of the gift, ruined by her own careless- 
ness : and how she reproached herself ! About that time 
Ruskin came in and saw her distress, as she held up the 
spoiled handkerchief. But he smilingly took it from her. 
Artist that he was, as well as poet, he went to his study 
and set to work upon that blot, drawing figures upon it; 
and then with delicate brushes he painted a beautiful 
picture, and returned the handkerchief to her. ''Oh," 
she said, "that is not my handkerchief!" "Yes, it is 
yours." "Mine?" "Yes. I simply took the ugly blot 
and transformed it into a picture !" 

How often God has done that, if we could only see 
it. He has taken our blotted life, when we have been 
sorely disappointed, and we thought we would have to 
go marred and mutilated through all our days, and He 
has handed it back with that mutilated background 



DAILY STRENGTH FOR DAILY NEEDS 39 

transformed into a picture. That is the beauty of being 
a Christian. That is what the blessing of Christ is, if 
we only realize it. 

To the overwrought and nerve-wrecked business man, 
to the worried housewife, to the young woman driven 
out from the safe shelter of home to the hard conditions 
of modern industry, and to all who walk in the shadow 
of sin, or the lonely way of pensive grief, our loving 
Father is able to and will give strength. 

BLESSEDXESS OF LIVING OXE DAY AT A TIME 

The third inspiring and comforting truth of this text 
is that this strength which our loving Heavenly Father 
gives us will be graduated according to our need. So 
it should be, to be in keeping with the conditions of 
our human life. The engine generates the steam to 
drive it as it rushes along the shining rails. If the 
effort were m.ade to put into the boiler, at the beginning 
of the journey, sufiicient steam to send it to its distant 
goal, the engine would be blown into a thousand pieces. 
And so God deals with us on the day by day and the 
hour after hour plan. He sent the manna to the children 
of Israel fresh every morning, and His promise to us 
is that His blessings shall be renewed to us day by day. 

And have you ever thought, my dear friend, how 
merciful and good God is to us in not allowing us to 
know the future? If, for example, we could know the 
blessings that are to comiC to us in the future, would not 
the tendency be to spoil us and to make us indolent and 
indifferent? If each individual should receive worldly 
rewards in exact proportion to virtues, and if he knew 
that immediately and surely those rewards were com- 
ing, would it not tend to destroy all right character 
and all heroism of soul? 



40 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

There is in Roger's ^'Grayson Letters" a description 
of a man whose conscience became so entangled with 
his stomach that every deception made him seasick. 
The least thought of untruth unsettled his stomach, so 
that he became truthful almost by force, and he soon 
came, therefore, to the point where he longed to be 
free so that he could know whether he really loved the 
truth for truth's sake, and whether he was willing to 
make sacrifices in order to maintain it. 

This element of uncertainty concerning the future, 
the casual quality which God has written into our lives, 
is a part of our truest blessedness, if we could only 
realize it. 

In that beautiful and striking story, 'The Garden of 
Allah," the hero, Dominic, and Androvsky are permitted 
the heavenly delights of their honeymoon in the midst 
of the beauty of the desert, as they journey from the 
charm of one oasis to another. This was permitted, I 
say, to them, and the fullness of their happiness and 
joy was unmarred by knowledge of the fact that a little 
further on would come the tragic revelation which would 
separate them forever, so far as the journey of earthly 
life was concerned. 

Yes, God is most gracious in that He hides the fu- 
ture from our view, and most wise in teaching us that 
''sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." 

When Rudyard Kipling visited America, some years 
ago, he played on the deck of the steamer, with rare 
buoyancy, with his little daughter, Josephine. Shortly 
after coming to New York, Josephine, whom he always 
called Joe, was taken seriously ill. Soon afterward, 
his own illness became alarming. During its earlier 
stages, he frequently asked, ''How is Joe?" Then his 
own illness became so serious that, for a time, the con- 
sciousness of his daughter disappeared. In his conva- 



DAILY STRENGTH FOR DAILY NEEDS 41 

lescence, he again asked, ''How is Joe? Where is she? 
Why does she not come to see me?'' 

But Joe had gone down into and had passed through 
the dark river, during her father's serious illness. When 
he asked these questions, she was asleep under the snows 
of an American winter. How merciful was God that He 
hid these coming sorrows from father and child during 
their joyous days on the deck of the Atlantic steamer! 

Yes, God is very merciful to us, in that he draws 
a curtain over the future. Very foolish, therefore, is it 
for us to load to-morrow's burden, too, upon that of to- 
day; and equally foolish is it to presume upon the suc- 
cess and the joy which shall be ours to-morrow. 

Avoiding both of these extremes, the highest philos- 
ophy of life is attained when we reach that point where, 
quietly and gratefully, we become willing to trust God 
absolutely and to live out our lives one day at a time! 

''Lord, for to-morrow and its needs, I do not pray; 
Keep me, my God, from stain of sin, just for to-day. 

Let me both diligently work and duly pray ; 

Let me be kind in word and deed, just for to-day. 

Let me in season. Lord, be grave, in season, gay; 
Let me be faithful to thy grace, just for to-day. 

So for to-morrow and its needs, I do not pray ; 

But keep me, guide me, love me, Lord, just for to-day." 



CHAPTER IV 

THE BITTER AND THE SWEET OF LIFE 

Text : "And when they came to Marah they could not drink of 
the waters of Marah, for they were bitter. . . . And they came to 
Elim, where were twelve wells of water and threescore and ten 
palm trees, and they encamped there by the waters." (Exodus 
15 :23-27.) 

Great lessons are taught us by the experiences of the 
children of Israel in their journey from the bondage of 
Egypt to the freedom and blessedness of the Promised 
Land. They started out, doubtless, joyfully and full of 
hope. They had the optimism that usually accompanies 
a high enterprise. They thought that the entire journey 
would be easy — ^a sort of triumphal march straight to 
the land ^'flowing with milk and honey.'' But they were 
destined to disillusionment. The first setback was at 
the Red Sea, when they faced the stern difficulties of a 
waste of waters before them and the hostile army of 
Pharaoh in the rear. 

But the greatest disappointment of all was to come at 
Marah. For three days, after crossing the Red Sea, they 
had marched under the scorching sun, with the hot sands 
of the desert about them and no water to drink. Those 
of us who have journeyed in that country can imagine 
their sufferings. But at last the tiding came that water 
was in sight. The glad cry went rolling from rank to 
rank, ''Water! Water! Thank God there is water!'' 
With feverish haste they rushed forward with glad an- 
ticipations of cooling draughts and refreshing shade; 

42 



THE BITTER AND SWEET OF LIFE 43 

but when they came to Marah they found the waters 
slimy and bitter so that they could not drink them. It 
was a sore disappointment that their weak faith and 
feeble powers of resistance could scarceh' overcome. 

But the beautiful thing about it is that God had not 
forgotten them. He knew the needs of His people. 
He knew that they could not always live at ^larah, so 
He led them to Elim, with its twelve springs and its 
threescore and ten palm trees. Water was there — ^pure 
and sparkling, cool and sweet, — ^and shade for man and 
beast, refreshing and dehghtful! 

Two great truths are taught us by this comforting 
and suggestive incident. 

DIA-ELOPMEXT THROUGH DIFFICULTIES 

The first is the truth of development through difn- 
culties. Why did God bring them to ^larah and through 
the other wilderness hardships? Because He knew that 
they needed the development which comes through stem 
discipline. They were still but an unorganized mob — 
millions of ex-slaves. They needed to be made into an 
army and into a nation, compact and strong and ready 
to endure. 

Too easy a time is never good for us. God did not 
build the world that way. Strength and self-reUance are 
produced by hardship. The sparkling beaut}^ of the dia- 
mond is developed by the roughness of the lapidarj^'s 
stone: the seab.'rd strengthens its pinions by buffeting 
the tempest and battling with the storms : the eagle de- 
velops its piercing voice by contending with the thunders 
that roll among the crag's; and a human life is made 
nobler, stronger and greater by the obstacles it over- 
comes, the dangers it faces, the hardships it endures. 
The greatest danger is never adversitj- but prosperity. 



44 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

It is the smooth ice upon which we shp. Rigor means 
vigor. New York has become the metropoHs of the 
world because she is founded upon a granite rock, and 
knows the biting breath of northern winters upon her 
cheek. 

The world's greatest men have been developed through 
difficulties. To a courageous spirit every obstacle be- 
comes an opportunity. Failure and defeat are only for 
him who is willing to accept them. Well does Emerson 
say: 

^The man or the woman who would have remained a 
sunny garden flower, with no room for its roots and too 
much sunshine for its head, by the falling of the walls and 
the neglect of the gardener, is made the banian of the for- 
est, yielding shade and fruit to wide neighborhoods of 
men." 

And again he says: 

'The martyr cannot be dishonored. Every lash in- 
flicted is a tongue of flame; every prison a more illustrious 
abode; every burned book or house enlightens the world; 
every suppressed or expunged word reverberates through 
the earth." 

We are in great danger in the raising of children to- 
day because of too much ease, luxury and self-indulgence. 
We may be able to rear a sturdy generation upon a diet 
pf downy beds, overheated houses, fancy food, lazy 
hours, moving-picture shows, ice cream cones, cigarettes, 
chewing gum and tango dances, but if we do we will 
accomplish the supreme miracle of the ages. Must we 
not develop more rapidly in intellectual grasp and in 
moral fiber that we may use and not abuse the material 
blessings which our marvelous civilization has brought? 
Must we not find, by some means, under the conditions 



THE BITTER AND SWEET OF LIFE 45 

of our modern life, a substitute for the discipline and 
austerities of the sterner days of the past which made 
our fathers great? 

life's compensation 

The other truth suggested by our text is that there 
is a compensation for every ill of life. God did not per- 
mit His people to tarry too long beside the bitter waters 
of Marah. He knew their limitations and suited His 
discipline to their capacities, and then led them on to 
rest and reward; and the waters of Elim were sweeter 
because of the bitter that went before. 

Emerson also says of this truth: 

'^Every excess causes a defect; every defect an excess. 
Every faculty which is a receiver of pleasure, has an equal 
penalty put on its abuse. It is to answer for its modera- 
tion with its life. For every grain of wit there is a grain 
of folly. For everything you have missed you have 
gained something else ; and for everything you gain, you 
lose something. If riches increase, they are increased 
that use them. If the gatherer gathers too much, nature 
takes out of the man what she puts into his chest; swells 
the estate, but kills the owner. Nature hates monopoHes 
and exceptions. The waves of the sea do not more speed- 
ily seek a level from their loftiest tossing, than the varie- 
ties of condition tend to equalize themselves." 

This great truth runs through all of life. I well re- 
member the impression that was made upon my mind 
and heart by the disorder and ugliness which I saw in 
the city of Washington in connection with the building 
of the new Central Station there. I had occasion several 
times to pass the spot where the new building was being 
erected. It looked like a nightmare from some hideous 



46 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

dream. Rows of old tawdry brick houses were half 
demolished, and piles of debris from them were scattered 
far and wide. Temporary railroad tracks criss-crossed 
each other in every direction, and hideous freight cars 
were on every side. Great piles of building material 
dotted the landscape, and steam shovels and concrete 
mixers, grimy and gritty, lifted their heads like slimy 
monsters belonging to a primeval time. The whole fair 
creation at that spot seemed to be groaning in travail. 
The bosom of the earth itself was gashed and ugly with 
red lines of the railroad excavations, and in the center 
of it all a mighty hole had been dug, where men, looking 
like gnomes, were digging far below the surface and put- 
ting in the foundations of a giant building. It was as 
complete a combination of disorder and ugliness as it is 
possible for the human mind to conceive ; and I distinctly 
remember what an impression it made upon me from that 
standpoint. 

But some years after my last visit, I stood again upon 
that spot, lost in awe and wonder; for there before me 
was a scene of almost fairy-like beauty. Wide avenues 
stretched away and away, green lawns were rippling in 
the breeze, flower gardens were smiling to the sky; 
graceful statuary could be seen upon the right hand and 
the left; the waters of fountains flashed in the golden 
sunlight, and in the center of it all, where the ugly hole 
had been, stood one of the most graceful and beautiful 
buildings in the world — the new Central Station — ^with 
its towering columns, its swelling dome, and its wide 
marble walls gleaming like alabaster. There is no lovelier 
picture on this continent made by man's hands than 
that which stands there in the nation's capital, and it 
was all the more lovely, as it flashed upon my vision for 
the first time, because of my memories of the ugliness 
and the disorder that had gone before. 



THE BITTER AND SWEET OF LIFE 47 

BREAKING THE HOME TIES 

Some of US remember the sadness at leaving the old 
home in the days that are gone. Every field was familiar 
to us, every tree on the place was precious, every item 
in the landscape had some association with memories of 
childhood which centered our affections there. The very 
rooms in the old house were holy. In one the baby had 
been bom, in another mother had died, in the parlor the 
weddings and the happy social gatherings had occurred, 
and childhood cast its glamour of romance and sweetness 
around it all. Therefore it was a sad time that night 
when the family gathered for the last time around the 
wide-mouthed fireplace. Father was pensive and every 
mind was thoughtful and preoccupied, and on the morrow 
tears quivered upon every eyelash as we glanced back- 
ward when we turned the bend in the road and caught 
the last glimpse of the spot which had been home and 
happiness to us all. 

But the change meant for us at last, did it not, in the 
full fruition of the passing years a new home and a 
wider life? The change meant larger opportunities, chil- 
dren of our own and the inflowing of new experiences 
of happiness and growth that freighted the memory with 
more abundant treasures than any of the past. 

Yes, there is a compensation for every ill of human 
life. Even the Captain of our salvation ''learned obedi- 
ence by the things He suffered." The divine Christ, our 
blessed Savior and Lord, ''made Himself of no reputation 
and took upon Him the form of a servant, and humbled 
Himxself and became obedient unto death even the death 
of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted 
Him and given Him a name which is above every name, 
that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow of 
things in heaven and things in earth, and things under 



48 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

the earth, and that every tongue should confess that 
Jesus Christ is Lord, to the gloiy of God the Father/' 
(Phil. 2:7-11.) ''Weeping may endure for a night, but 
joy Cometh in the morning." (Psalm 30:5.) 

CHEER FOR ALL 

So may we not accept the comfort and the healing of 
God's great truth in our individual hearts and lives? 
However dark the way may be at present, dear heart, the 
light will break by and by, even for you. Are you 
camping now, my friend, beside the bitter waters ? Has 
some great sadness fallen upon your life — some disap- 
pointed hope — some wrecked ambition — some severing of 
ties of love — some long good-bye that inexorable fate or 
remorseless time have demanded that your lips should 
speak? Are you standing w^ith perplexity and despair 
by the bitter waters of Alarah? Oh, believe me, Elim 
is just out yonder! Elim with its twelve springs and 
its threescore and ten palm trees, and there you shall 
find the meaning of this sorrow and the benefit of this 
present defeat; and the refreshment will be sweeter for 
the bitterness that has gone before! 

May we not also find an application of both of these 
great truths in the world conditions of to-day? Many 
are disturbed by the awful catastrophe of the European 
war and its aftermath of bitterness, class-consciousness 
and strife. Alen are w'ondering if modern civiHzation 
and even Christianity itself have failed. Not a few 
honest souls, seeing only the surface of things, are 
drifting toward pessimism and despair. Let us hearten 
ourselves at such a time as this by climbing the heights 
of God's great truth, where we can breathe the rarer air 
and see the wider landscape. Though humanity has 
come now, through its own greed and avarice and sin. 



THE BITTER AND SWEET OF LIFE 49 

to the bitter waters of war and destruction, neverthe- 
less, with firm faith we can still believe that Elim is 
before us, that God will overrule even the present 
horrors for the deeper welfare of the race, and that once 
again he will vindicate His majesty and power by mak- 
ing ''the wrath of man to praise Him." 

The thoughtful mind can discern already the fulfill- 
ment of the Bible prophecies concerning the better time, 
that is coming, in connection with the return of our 
blessed Lord. May we not, therefore, leave off our 
doubts and pessimism and despair, and believe that even 
out of the supreme tragedy of all the ages — the great 
carnival of brutality, blood and dishonor — God will bring 
deeper blessings to the race? Though the roots of the 
war and its after effects were in hell, its branches shall 
wave in heaven and bear fruit for the healing of the 
nations. After the tribulation comes the triumph. After 
the Marah of this agony we will see the Elim of a more 
blessed social order than humanity has yet dared even 
dream — 3l civiHzation just and righteous and true, whose 
only law is love and whose only king is Christ! 



CHAPTER V 
THE BLESSED SHADOW 

Text: ''And by the hands of the Apostles were many signs and 
wonders wrought amongst the people; insomuch that they brought 
forth the sick into the streets and laid them upon beds and couches, 
that, at the least the shadow of Peter, passing by, might over- 
shadow some of them." (Acts 5:12 and 15.) 

These words suggest at once the thought of uncon- 
scious influence, and surely no observant eye can look 
out upon the world in which we live without seeing that 
there is such a thing as unconscious influence. We meet 
it in every realm of nature. Those who have had an 
introduction to the fascinating and beautiful science of 
chemistry w^ll remember the principle of catalysis, or 
influence of presence — the principle by which one chemi- 
cal element affects another, while remaining itself all 
unaffected. For example, if hydrogen gas is poured 
upon platinum sponge, the hydrogen is immediately 
burned up. In other words the contact of the hydrogen 
Vv^ith the platinum causes the hydrogen to unite with 
the oxygen in the air around it and thus to be completely 
consumed. While bringing to pass, however, these far- 
reaching changes in the other two elements, the platinum 
remains absolutely unaffected and seemingly unconscious 
of it all. We see this truth illustrated in the vegetable 
kingdom. If you will journey to the far north — to the 
north pole — where Lieutenant Peary w^nt, and where Dr. 
Cook dreamed that he went, you will find no vegetation. 
There is nothing there, save a wilderness of ice and snow 

50 



THE BLESSED SHADOW 51 

and forbidding skies and wintr}^ winds. Journey south- 
ward, however, and the traveler comes at last to the 
first faint signs of vegetable life. A bit of moss on 
the bank, or a lichen upon a stone, and then will come 
tough, harsh grasses and then stunted underbrush and 
then large trees, and on and on until the traveler reaches 
the torrid zone and finds himself in the midst of a 
marvelous wealth of vegetable life. He looks in wonder 
upon giant trees lifting their leafy heads to the skies; 
upon festoons of vines and climbing plants that fling 
out their crimson banners in the very tops of the forest's 
giants, and upon the matchless array of flowers, delight- 
ing the eye with a million delicate tints and ravishing the 
nostrils with delicious perfume. All the way through 
the vegetable kingdom the response of life to its environ- 
ment and the operation of unconscious influence are facts 
completely obvious. 

So, also, in the animal kingdom does this truth apply. 
The tree-frog is green, like the leaf upon which it lives. 
The partridge is brown, like its stubble field. The lion 
is as gray as the desert w'aste over w^hich he holds his 
imperial sway; while the polar bear is white, like the 
snow^-capped summits of his northern home. And so, if 
we cared to trace it out, this truth of influence, this fact 
of the response of life to its environment, would startle 
us at every turn throughout the entire realm of nature. 

The tide that kisses the ''crescent sea beach" and en- 
chants the whispering lovers surges in answer to the 
swing of a far-distant w^orld. The cloud that floats in 
feathery whiteness against the blue of the summer sky, 
or bursts asunder in the fury of the thunderstorm, or 
discharges the gentle shower upon the thirsty earth, has 
been lifted long before from the sleeping bosom of the 
sea. And the coal that cheers the home circle on the 
winter nights is the offering of far distant eons of time 



52 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

when the mighty forests laid down their lives that we 
to-day might Hve. 



THE MIGHT OF HIDDEN THINGS 

May I ask you to notice, too, that these forces of 
nature and of Hfe are very powerful, though seemingly 
gentle or even entirely unseen ? In fact, the most power- 
ful influences of life are not those which are the most 
dramatic. We think of the earthquake as a tremendous 
power because of this dramatic quality. I stood some 
years ago in the midst of the stricken city of San Fran- 
cisco, following the earthquake and the fire that laid 
that proud and beautiful metropolis low. I stood upon 
a central eminence and looked out upon miles of ruins. 
I saw great buildings that had been toppled down like 
a child's playhouse of cards, and beautiful boulevards 
that had been rent into gaping fissures, where one side 
of the crack was a foot or more higher than the other, 
and I thought 'Vhat a tremendous force this was to de- 
stroy, almost in an instant of time, the proud achieve- 
ments of man's genius and power." But then a second 
thought came to me, and it Vv^as this : ''Well, after all, 
it was not a very great force. Just one little tremor of 
a small section of the earth's crust is an earthquake. 
It is its dramatic quality that makes it impressive and 
that adds its terror." 

Compare now with this one of the really great forces 
of the universe. For example, the attraction of gravity. 
Silently, unobtrusively, and entirely unnoticed, it works. 
Not once in a year do we speak of it, and yet it is the 
great controlHng force of all the universe, holding the 
earth true to its orbit as it rushes around the central 
sun; directing the course and destiny of every flaming 
world in the heavens above, and conditioning life abso^ 



THE BLESSED SHADOW 53 

lutely upon this planet, so that if this mysterious force 
were withdrawn for a single second every atom of life 
upon the planet would be instantly destroyed and our 
world would fly off a forlorn and lifeless wanderer rush- 
ing into the measureless abysses of space. 

Or, take again the influences of the sunlight. We do 
not think of it as a very great power. We do think of 
a stroke of lightning as tremendous, because of its dra- 
matic and terrifying effects. We see it blast the giant 
oak, or destroy the life of man or beast, and we say 
what an awful power! And some of the ladies are in- 
clined to seek protection from its furies between feather 
beds. But a stroke of lightning is a very insignificant 
influence. It is less than a drop to the ocean of force. 
It is but an atom within the drop, as compared with 
such a power as sunlight, which we scarcely ever notice 
at all. 

How gentle it is. It falls at morning upon the babe 
asleep in its downy cradle, and kisses it so lightly as 
not to disturb its dream. It touches the dew-drop, 
sparkling upon the spider's gossamer or the lily's leaf, 
but it caresses it so gently as not to destroy one atom of 
its tender form. And yet locked up in the modest, 
silent, unobtrusive operation of the sunlight are all the 
forces of life and progress in our world. It draws the 
mighty forests out of the earth and spreads the fields 
with bountiful harvests. It stores the energy that sends 
the great locomotive rushing across the continent 
through the darkness of the night, or that drives the giant 
steamship safely through the stormy seas. Let this silent, 
unobtrusive, and yet most potent, influence be withdrawn 
for a single second of time from our earth, and instantly 
icy death would grasp the throat of all humanit>% and the 
beauty and bloom of every garden would wither and die. 



54 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

MAN SUBJECT TO THESE LAWS 

I have said all this in order that I might lead up to 
that which I really want to say, and that is that men 
and women are subject to this universal law of uncon- 
scious influence. No man liveth to himself and no man 
dieth to himself. Whether we will or not, our lives are 
profoundly influenced by that which is around us; and 
we, in turn, grapple our fellowmen with a milHon in- 
visible and yet potent and powerful hands. 

I say that we are influenced by our environment, and 
this truth is behind the great reform movements of this 
age in every field of human thought and activity. The 
balances have often been cast between the forces of 
heredity and environment, but modern thought is com- 
ing more and more to see that the latter immeasurably 
outweighs the former. There is a healing in nature's 
processses which tends to eliminate the hurtful and the 
bad, and while it is true that the forces of heredity are 
potent, all of nature and God's beneficent designs are 
making for the elimination of that which is destructive 
by heredity, in both the moral and physical field. Each 
new generation of babies is God's fresh promise and 
pledge to the world of better things. 

But, in the dark and sinister force of wrong environ- 
ment, inspired by hell and created by perverted manhood, 
is the real challenge and danger to the race. The books 
that we read, the places that we frequent, the companions 
with whom we associate, the thoughts that we welcome 
into the chambers of our souls ; these at last are the really 
dominant and powerful factors in the control of conduct 
and the creation of character. 

There are certain places of resort and circles of social 
influence into which a young man can no more enter 
without pollution than he could pass through a miasmic 



THE BLESSED SHADOW 55 

swamp without suffering from the deadly germs of ma- 
laria and typhus. The young woman who consents 
to associate with a certain type of youth, all too prevalent 
in our modern society, can no more come out from such 
influences unaffected than she could touch pitch and yet 
remain unsullied. With high courage and invincible 
enthusiasm, modern society is striving to rid itself of its 
saloons, its red-light districts, its foul tenements, its un- 
just economic system, and its antiquated schools, because 
it is keenly alive to the tremendous significance of wrong 
environment in the lives of its youth. 

EACH RESPONSIBLE FOR AN INFLUENCE 

The other side of this same great truth is that we all 
affect our environment. Unconscious the influence may 
be, and yet powerfully, definitely, and positively, either 
for evil or good, it is exerted. 

It may be an evil influence that flows out of our lives 
all unconsciously day by day. This truth was impressed 
forcefully upon my mind during my youth. In the Httle 
city where we lived, there was a merchant who was 
famous through the county for his stinginess. He was 
known as "Aleck" for short, but he was said to hold 
the record for closeness, and I believe that he lived 
up to his reputation. He was the skimpiest, stingiest, 
most penurious man I have ever known. The neighbors 
told it on him that he would stop his clock at night to 
make it last longer, and that he breathed through his nose 
to keep from wearing out his false teeth. They said 
that he demanded of his wife that she skim the milk 
on both sides of the pan, holding that the top alone was 
not enough for cream. He was the type of man who is 
said to brush off a fly's legs before he will let him leave 
his sugar barrel, who would skin a flea for his hide and 



56 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

tallow, and who, in moments of unusual temptation, 
would steal a dead fly from a blind spider ! He went 
out in the country and joined a country church, be- 
cause religion was cheaper in the country than it w^as 
in town. They had preaching only once a month, and 
the controlling board of the church would not permit 
such a luxury as hymn books. A\'hen the collection was 
being taken, Aleck's mouth was so wide open singing 
that he could not see the contribution plate, and they used 
to say that, when the country parson lined out ''Old 
Hundred,'' Aleck would sing ''Xinety-nine" to save one 
per cent. 

Well, I saw a boy go into that store to clerk for him. 
When he went in he was like any other normal American 
boy — big hearted, broad, generous and noble. But he 
stayed for four years in that store and came out a sec- 
ond ''Aleck." He was just as sting}-, just as close-fisted, 
just as penurious, as his employer. It was impossible 
for him to remain under the influence of that strong 
dominant personality without having his character per- 
manently warped. 

THE POWER OF A SINGLE WORD 

The Bible tells us that we will be brought into judg- 
ment for every idle and thoughtless word. This seems 
at first glance a harsh saying, but when we remember 
that a word is a living vital thing, moving on in its 
influence through the centuries, the justice of the judg- 
ment becomes clear. 

There is an illustration from English history w^hich 
shows, in touching and tragic fashion, the power for 
evil of a single word, thoughtlessly spoken. When 
Thomas a Becket and Prince Henry were young men, 
they were bosom friends and constant companions. But 



THE BLESSED SHADOW 57 

when Prince Henrv' became King Henry the Second, and 
Thomas a Becker became Archbishop of Canterbury 
and head of the Enghsh church, an estrangement sprang 
up between the two men. The King desired a certain 
poHcy pursued by the church, but Thomas a Becket did 
not beheve that it was to the best interests of God's 
cause, and so he refused to comply with the desires of 
the King. The breach widened and deepened, until at 
last the King sent a micssage to Thomas a Becket com- 
manding him to do a certain thing. But he sent back 
a respectful yet firm reply to the effect that, while he 
honored his earthly Sovereign, his first loyalty was to 
the King of Heaven and that, therefore, not e^'en upon 
the command of the King would he do that which he 
felt to be detrimental to the deeper welfare of the church 
of the living God. 

When this reply was brought to King Henry, as he 
sat upon his throne, he flew into a violent passion. The 
courage and the sublime fidelit}' of the reply ought to 
have kindled his profound admiration, but he was in a 
petulant humor, and when the ansvv'er was read to him, 
he exclaimed, '*0h, will no one rid m.e of this miserable 
priest?" And two of the courtiers who were standing 
beside the throne, taking this as a hint from the King 
that he wanted Thomas a Becket put out of the way, 
undertook a secret pilgrimage to Canterbury-. They dis- 
guised themselves as monks, with long robe and cowl, 
but beneath their monkish robes they had their keen 
daggers hidden. They v\-ent into the cathedral at Can- 
terbury late in the afternoon. The Archbishop was at 
his afternoon devotions in his private chapel. The two 
assassins shpped stealthily down the aisle till they were 
just above the kneeling form. Then for one second 
their keen daggers glistened above their heads, and the 
next second they were buried in the back and through 



58 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

the heart of the kneehng priest. And he died there, with 
his blood flowing out upon the steps of the ahar of God. 
Then the two murderers went back to the King, think- 
ing that they would be richly rewarded for their deed; 
but instead of that, King Henry was horrified. All the 
early love for his friend came rushing back again upon 
his heart. The memory of his grace and courage over- 
whelmed him. And, instead of rewarding the assassins, 
he had them cast into prison and later beheaded; and 
every year thereafter, to the time of his death, he made 
a pilgrimage to Canterbury, where he walked barefoot 
down the aisle of the cathedral and knelt at the altar 
to ask God's forgiveness. Only one word spoken in 
thoughtless anger, but three lives lost, and the happiness 
of a great king wrecked! So, should we w^onder at the 
saying that we shall be brought into judgment for every 
idle and thoughtless word ? And yet there are 3^ouths who 
pride themselves upon the very foulness of their thought 
and language. 



THE BETTER SIDE 

We turn now to the brighter side of this truth; to the 
thought of good influence and its power over life. ^^That 
the shadow of Peter passing by might overshadow some 
of them T' Here was a man so full of love and the power 
of Jesus Christ that his very shadow carried healing in its 
wings. There were so many sick people in that land, 
and that age of suffering and disease, that it was impos- 
sible for the disciples to minister to them all individually. 
So the solicitous friends brought forth the poor, the 
crippled, the halt, the lame, and the blind, and laid 
them on beds and couches along the road that the shadow 
of Peter as he passed by might overshadow and heal 



THE BLESSED SHADOW 59 

them. How beautiful is the picture of a Hfe so strong 
and righteous! 

And the glorious thing about it ml is that each one 
of us may have such a life. What dignity and meaning 
does it give to human life upon this planet of ours, that 
our very presence, as we walk the highv/ay of the years, 
may bring brightness and cheer and healing and hope 
to all who touch us day by day. 

But some one now is thinking, *'But my life is so 
small, the circle of my influence is so circumscribed. 
What can I do?" Oh, beUeve me, my dear friend, you 
can do that which will touch eternity, and which will 
bless the world in ways infinitely greater and more far- 
reaching than you can ever see or understand. Owen 
Meredith has truly said: 

'^No stream from its source flows seaward, 
How lonely soever its way, 
But some land is gladdened. 

No star ever rose and set, 
But had influence somewhere. 

Who knows what earth needs 
From earth's lowest creatures? 

No life can be pure in its passion 

And strong in its strife. 

And all hfe not be purer and stronger thereby.'' 

Robert Browning gives us the same beautiful thought 
in his exquisite poem, 'Tippa Passes.'' He pictures the 
little milk girl going singing through the long day, and 
unconsciously influencing and profoundly changing the 
plans of the great people by whose door she went singing 



6o THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

on her way. And Longfellow has told for us the story 
of 'The Arrow and the Song" : 

**I shot an arrow into the air, 
It fell to earth, I knew not where; 
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight 
Could not follow it in its flight. 

I breathed a song into the air. 
It fell to earth, I knew not where ; 
For who has sight so keen and strong 
That it can follow the flight of song? 

^ Long years afterward, in an oak, 

I found the arrow still unbroke; 
And the song, from beginning to end, 
I found again in the heart of a friend." 

OLD AUNT MILLY 

And here, too, a single word or a simple experience 
may profoundly influence character. During the happy 
childhood days, down in old Georgia, we were blessed — 
my brothers and I — with an old-fashioned negro 
^^Mammy." Aunt Milly was one of the best Christians 
I have ever known. But she was as black as ebony and 
as superstitious as any member of her race. She was 
a profound believer in ''hants,'' ghosts, and everything 
else that had to do with the supernatural. 

Taking advantage of this trait, my two brothers and I 
planned one night to have some fun at Aunt Milly's ex- 
pense. We got an enormous pumpkin, hollowed the 
inside out, cut two great staring eyes, an enormous nose, 
and a hideous, snaggled tooth mouth. We pasted red 
tissue paper over the eyes, yellow tissue paper over the 
nose and green tissue paper over the mouth. Then we 



4\ 



_j 



THE BLESSED SHADOW 6i 

lit a candle and put it inside the pumpkin and carried 
the whole thing out behind Aunt ]\Iilly's little house in 
my father's back yard. We put the pumpkin on a fence 
post, immediately behind her back window, and then 
draped a bed sheet, ghost like, around the post. Then 
we planned to slip up to Aunt ]\Iilly's window, knock on 
the shutter, stand to one side, and watch her amaze- 
ment and fright as she threw open the blinds and saw 
herself face to face with the apparition which we believed 
she would take to be a horrible ''hant.'' Well, we had 
everything in readiness, but when we got up to the win- 
dow, and were just about to knock, we heard a voice 
inside, and, looking in through the crack under the 
wooden shutter, we savr old Aunt I\Iilly down on her 
knees beside her bed, saying her prayers before she re- 
tired for the night. .\nd it happened that just as we goU 
up to the window she was praying for us. She prayed 
for us every night, but, by strange coincidence — or was 
it divine providence? — she reached that part of her prayer 
just as we reached her window. **God bless Marse 
Willie. God bless Marse Charlie. God bless Marse 
Johnny. 2vlake 'em good boys,'' etc. And there she 
knelt, with her old black face bright with the light of 
another world, as she carried our names to the throne 
of the Heavenly Father in prayer ! 

And do you know what we did? Well, you know 
for one thing tliat we did not knock on that blind. If 
any of you had been there that night, you would have 
seen three bad boys slip away from a window without a 
sound, slap a pumpkin off a fence post, take up a sheet 
and hurr}- up to the big house: and if my two brothers 
were affected as I was, all three went to sleep with a 
tear in our eyes, after we had said our own prayers that 
night. 

As we stood there in the darkness behind that humble 



62 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

little home, we remembered who Aunt Mllly was. We 
remembered how she had been our unchanging friend in 
many a time of storm and stress. We remembered that 
when there was trouble between father and any one of 
us, the kitchen was our harbor, and Aunt Milly's lap our 
place of solace. We remembered how, when mother was 
sick with the long fever, old Aunt Milly had nursed her, 
caring for her with a mother's tenderness during the day, 
and then, lying down, like a faithful watch dog, on her 
pallet beside the bed to be near her through the long hours 
of the night, for she had said: "No hand but Milly's 
hand to tend Miss JuHe !" 

I have never gotten away from the influence of that 
simple picture. Both Aunt Milly, and the sweet mother 
whom she nursed, have long since passed on to the bright- 
er country ; but I know that I am a better man to-day be- 
cause old Aunt Milly prayed for me in that far-away 
time. She was only an old black woman, with wrinkled 
face and gnarled fingers. She was utterly without edu- 
cation or social standing. She never knew anything 
about our plot against her, nor how near she came to a 
terrible fright. She only knew to love us and to have 
faith in God and to pray for us, but that was enough! 

THE IMMORTALITY OF A GOOD INFLUENCE 

One more thought and I am done. It is this : These 
influences which our lives exert are immortal. Our 
scientists tell us that matter is indestructible. You can 
change its form, but you cannot destroy it. They also 
tell us that there is such a thing as the conservation of 
energy; that no force in all the universe is ever lost. 
Drop a pebble into the midst of the sea and a tiny wave 
will spread out from that center, and its goes widening 
and widening until it has crossed the entire ocean, and 



THE BLESSED SHADOW 63 

then that impulse of energy will be transmitted from the 
water to the land, and move on among the atoms of mat- 
ter forever. And how inspiring it is to know^ that there 
is such a thing as moral and spiritual conservation of 
energ>^; that a good deed never dies, but that it shines 
forever, a thing of beauty in a ''naughty world/' 

Several summers ago I was spending a vacation on 
the Pacific coast. One afternoon I was walking beside 
the sea a few miles out from the beautiful city of Los 
Angeles, California. It had been a perfect day, and I 
there witnessed the most beautiful sunset that I had 
ever looked upon. Lovelier than any I had witnessed 
in Italy or Greece or amidst the fascinating countries of 
the East. The whole western sk}^ was piled high with 
billowy clouds, and every cloud was aflame with inde- 
scribable color — crimson and purple and saftron and gold 
and pink, all blended in a matchless melody of beauty, 
with the fiery beams of the setting sun piercing like 
mighty javelins through it all. And the sea beneath re- 
flected every irridescent tint above, until its mighty 
bosom was glowing like a giant opal! 

But at last the sun laid his cheek upon the wave, and 
then sank out of sight below the horizon's rim. But 
though he had disappeared from view, his bright beam.s 
were still sparkling on the snow-crowned summit of 
Mt. Lowe, that stands inland but a few miles from the 
shore; and as I watched, the sno^\y whiteness of the 
mountain changed into pink and then that faded out into 
a ghostly gray, and then the sunlight entirely disappeared. 
But even then, through the wonderful after-glow, the 
whole upper heavens were full of light. Long, long after 
the sun itself had disappeared, it was still possible to 
read a newspaper beneath those glowing skies. And as 
I stood that afternoon, lost in rapt wonder and delight, 
the scene became to my heart a parable of a righteous 



64 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

influence. The life that walks with God and finds its 
highest satisfaction in blessing men will live on in the 
beauty of its memories and the perennial youth of its 
noble ideals, though the poor clay of the earthly form 
may lie moldering into dust. 

^'O may I join the choir invisible 
Of those immortal dead who live again 
In minds made better by their presence: live 
In pulses stirred to generosity, 
In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn 
For miserable aims that end with self, i 

In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars, 
And w^th their mild persistence urge man's search 
To vaster issues. So to live is heaven. 
. . . This is life to come, 
Which martyred men have made more glorious 
For us who strive to follow. May I reach 
That purest heaven, be to other souls 
The cup of strength in some great agony, 
Enkindle generous ardor, feed pure love, 
Beget the smiles that have no cruelty — 
Be the sweet presence of a good diffused 
And in diffusion ever more intense. 
So shall I join the choir invisible 
Whose music is the gladness of the world/* 



CHAPTER Yl 

THE MEAXIXG OF CHRIST'S COMING INTO 
THE WORLD 

Text : ^'Behold thy King ccmeth. '' (Matthew 21 : 5. ) 

W'e have all seen the dawning of what promised to 
be a perfect day. We have seen the sun come over 
the eastern hills in splendor, lifting the lazy darkness, 
driving back the mists of night, and flooding the dew^- 
encrusted earth with all the soft sweetness of the 
morning. But as the hours passed w^e have seen a change 
come across the face of nature. We have beheld the 
brightness dimmed bjr^ cloud and shadow. In awe and 
wonder we have w^atched the lurid flash of the lightning 
and heard the roar of thunder and the rush of wind as 
the world trembled beneath the fury of the storm. 

But again, before the close of day, we have seen the 
clouds Uft and the shadows flee away, and the promise 
of the morning realized in the glories of a perfect sun- 
set ; when the world lay refreshed and quiet, and its 
closing hours were filled w4th the songs of birds and 
the soft radiance of the evening lights. 

As we contemplate the closing scenes of our Lord's 
earthly life, such impressions as these are borne in 
upon the soul. These final chapters open with the bright 
beauty of the triumphal entr}^ We watch the waving 
pal::: branches and listen to the glad hosannahs of the 
multitude and the sweet songs of the little children ring- 

65 



66 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

ing through the arches of the ancient Temple. We see 
the hearts of the common people — ^always right until 
polluted by such forces as the foes of Christ represented 
— responding in simple faith and joined to the intuitive 
trust of childhood to do honor to earth's spiritual King. 
But then the shadows of Gethsemane fall across the pic- 
ture, and the dark storm of Calvary breaks; to be fol- 
lowed, however, by the serene splendor of the resur- 
rection. 

The coming of Christ as a King into the Holy City 
was in fulfillment of ancient prophecy. The rapt vision 
of Isaiah had foreseen it; and even in the midst of 
Israel's decline and deep despair, Zechariah had looked 
into the promise of the coming years and exclaimed with 
triumphant faith: 

'^Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion; shout, O daugh- 
ter of Jerusalem; behold, thy King cometh unto thee; he 
is just, and having salvation; lowly, and riding upon an 
ass, and upon a colt the foal of an ass." 

It was fitting that the Messiah, the Ruler of the King- 
dom of God, which was now about to be established, 
should thus enter Jerusalem. His riding in this tri- 
umphal procession was a proclamation to all the people 
that He was a King, that His Kingdom was at hand; 
and also somewhat of its spiritual peculiarities and dig- 
nities. He came not in the pomp and circumstance of 
mihtary power, sitting upon the war-horse of an earthly 
hero, but in democratic simplicity riding upon the animal 
which is the symbol of meekness and the burden bearer 
in the arts of peace. 

And there is for us a significant meaning in this dra- 
matic and moving incident. While we await the final 
return of Christ as King, we do not lose sight of the 
fact that even now He has entered in triumph into multi- 



MEANING OF CHRISTS COMING 67 

tudes of human hearts, and there is ruling as the real 
Lord of Life. Even while we are waiting for the final 
consummation of His Kingdom, there is in a sense a 
way therefore in which He rules even now. Wherever 
a soul is born again, there Christ reigns and the Kingdom 
lives, and we have cause for justifiable pride in the 
greatness and glory even of His present dominion. 

That first Palm Sunday prefigured the entire story 
of the church here below. The history of the church 
is but a picture of the march of our glorified Lord 
across continents and centuries. And at the present 
hour no king upon earth rules over so wide a territory 
as does Christ; no emperor or president can claim the 
voluntary allegiance of so many souls as Christ; no con- 
stitution or code controls the actions of so many mil- 
lions of loyal spirits as does the Sermon on the Mount; 
no organized force in government, commerce, finance 
or the vital industries employs the hearts and hands of 
so militant and masterful a brotherhood as does the cause 
of Christ; no field of letters is comparable with the 
literature of Christ; no ensign of a nation leads to peace, 
prosperity and power so great a host as does the banner 
of Christ. His white flag with the crimson cross floats 
high above every earthly ensign, and it is leading on 
toward the final domination of the whole world. De- 
spite the fact that we are a fallen race, it is nevertheless 
to our credit that multitudes among the children of men 
have ever delighted to honor Him, and even in this dark 
day of selfishness and sin, there is still, thank God, a 
saving remnant of those who are given over wholly to 
the Master's service. In the midst of the strife and the 
bickering of these latter times, there is much of glorious 
heroism and noble unselfishness that finds its mainspring 
in the forces that Jesus has turned loose among men. 
The highest sentiment of the race still waves its palm 



68 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

branches before Him; the noblest moral enthusiasms of 
men still spread their garments in His pathway, and 
the best of earth still shout Hosanna to His Name. 

I wish, however, in this meditation, not to discuss 
the theological aspects of this triumphant entrance into 
Jerusalem, or the second coming of our Lord, but I 
desire rather to use the incident as symbolic of Christ's 
triumphant entrance into earthly affairs. 

Let us inquire then, more specifically, what is the 
meaning of Christ's entrance into human history? What 
are the forces by w^iich He has triumphed and will con- 
tinue to triumph, despite all apostasies and temporary 
backsets, until at last He Himself shall come again in 
glory, and His Kingdom shall gather beneath its benefi- 
cent rule all the children of men? 

In the effort to answer those questions, may we not 
generalize broadly by saying that there is a three-fold 
significance to the entrance of Christ into the w^orld? 
He came first as the Donor of salvation; secondly, as 
the Creator of character; and thirdly, as the Guarantor 
of eternal life. 

THE DONOR OF SALVATION 

The first outstanding significance of Christ's entrance 
into history is that He came as the Donor of salvation. 
The herald angels had said: 'Thou shalt call His name 
Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins." 
And He Himself explicitly declared His mission when 
He said: *'The son of man is come to seek and to save 
that which was lost." 

This proclamation of His mission recognizes the stern 
and terrible fact that men, in their natural state, are 
alienated from God, enslaved by sin and without hope 
in themselves. The long, dark, tragic story of the race 



MEANING OF CHRIST'S COMING 69 

from Adam to Christ illustrates the total inabilit}' of 
men to save themselves and verifies the counsel of the 
Psalmist, "Put not your trust in princes, nor in the son 
of man, in whom there is no help." 

Browning in "Saul," his great poem of redemptive 
grace, pictures the first King of Israel alienated from 
God because of his transgressions until his reason tot- 
ters upon its throne. For three days Saul separates 
himself from his people in the dark solitude of his inner 
tent. Not a sound is heard by the anxious attendants, 
and they fear that the insane king will die. David is 
sent for — 

"God's child, with His dew 
On thy gracious gold hair. 
And those lilies, stiU living and blue, 
Just broken to t^vine 'round thy harpstrings. 

:*c ^ :«t :«£ 5*1 :tc :«£ 

Lest they snap 'neath the stress of the noontide." 

The young shepherd, the embodiment of youthful 
health and beaut}-, and fuU of the joy of life and the 
sweetness of God's out-of-doors, comes Vv'ith his harp 
in the hope that his melody may call back the wander- 
ing reason and save the diseased king. He finds the 
giant form of Saul standing motionless in the blackness 
of the inner tent, his arms outstretched on the cross sup- 
port of the main tent pole, as Browning says, like a 
great king snake caught by the chill of winter hanging 
in the pine tree until spring returns with vrarm release. 

David plays upon the harp various melodies which he 
has weU mastered in the sunny, shepherding days on 
Judean hillsides. There is the tune for the sheepfold- 
ing, the calling of the quails, the harvest song of the 
reapers, the funeral dirge, the marriage processional, 



70 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

the march of the builders and the chorus of the Levites 
as they approached the altar. At this last, Saul groaned 
in soul. When the note of sacrifice was sounded, there 
was a response in the bosom of the guilty and needy 
King. 

Then David sought to rouse him by singing of life's 
joy of living, of the rich opportunities and favors of 
fortune, the fond hopes of kindred and friends which 
had so abundantly dowered Saul's kingship. The tense, 
rigid form of the monarch is now relaxed. Physical 
death is past. But spiritual life has not come. David 
renews his minstrelsy. He sings earnestly on of the pos- 
sibihties of true kingship, and the praise of after 
generations. 

Then the futihty of human effort to lift a man to God 
appears to the singer's mind. He was helpless to do 
for Saul what only a higher love and power could do. 
He had roused the sinful king and led him to the heights 
of new hope. Then the chasm appeared which all the 
yearning skill of David could not bridge. Would God 
forgive Saidf That was the great question, and man 
could not answer it. Sin, David realized, was against 
God, and only God, therefore, could forgive it and take 
the sinner back to His heart. 

Then, in an agony of vicarious longing, it came to 
the soul of David that he — a man — would suffer and 
endure self-sacrifice to save the king, and therefore that 
God would do the same. Through this impulse of human 
love David attains to the vision of the Divine Love and 
the Everlasting Mercy: — 

''See the King — I would help him, but cannot, the wishes 
fall through. 
Could I wrestle to raise him from sorrow, grow poor 
to enrich. 



MEANING OF CHRIST'S COMING 71 

To fill up his life, stance my own out I would — know- 
ing which, 
I know that my service is perfect. Oh, speak through 

me now! 
Would I sufler for him that I love? So w^ouldst Thou, 

so wilt Thou. 
So shall crown Thee the topmost, ineffablest, uttermost 

crown — 
And thy love fill infinitude wholly, nor leave up, nor 

down, 
One spot for the creature to stand on! It is by no 

breath. 
Turn of eye, wave of hand, that salvation joins issue 

with death! 
As Thy love is discovered almighty, almighty be proved 
Thy power, that exists with and for it, of being beloved! 
'Tis the weakness in strength that I cry for ! 
My flesh that I seek in the Godhead \ 
I seek and I find it!'' 

Thus it comes to David that God will manifest Him- 
self in human flesh and suffer to give man salvationj 
So he exclaims in rapture : 

'^O Saul, it shall be 
A Face like to my face that receives thee; a man like 

to me. 
Thou shalt love and be loved by, forever; a Hand like 

to this hand 
Shall throw open the gates of new life to thee! See, 

the Christ stand!'' 

''See the Christ stand!" That is the last word of 
impotent man in the awful presence of human sin and 
guilt. The high spirits of earth from many climes and 
ages have given us words of beauty and truth, but 
none have been able to save a dying soul. Only God 
can do that. And it is the unique distinction of Chris- 



72 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

tianity that Christ alone has brought this truth into the 
world. As he stands in the midst of the ages He holds 
in His outstretched hand the free gift of spiritual life. 
It is by no human breath, turn of eye or wave of hand 
that salvation joins issue with death. Every other re- 
ligion of earth means man reaching upward to God. 
Christianity means God reaching downward to man! 
''Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He 
loved us, and gave His Son to be the propitiation for 
our sins." 

Salvation is not an achievement; it is an acceptance. 
We are but pensioners on the Divine bounty. There is 
''not one spot for the creature to stand on.'' "By grace 
are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. 
It is the gift of God; not of works, lest any should 
boast." We poor sinners are a proud race. If there 
could be any merit in ourselves we would grow vain and 
self-sufficient and claim it all. So it is that God in His 
infinite wisdom and love has stripped us bare, and with 
a grace free as the air, warm as the sunlight and wide 
as the sea has reached down to fallen man — requiring 
nothing, but giving all, following through sin and shame 
even to the gates of hell itself to "surprise the guilty 
with forgiveness and the fallen with hope!" 

And this He is able to do through the great plan of 
self-sacrifice in suffering for sin. God can thus be 
"just, and yet the justified of all who believe in Christ." 

Those who have difficulty with the thought of vicari- 
ous atonement have not sounded the profoundest depths 
of life. We see this truth about us on every hand. The 
sun gives itself in unrestricted bounty to the earth, and 
exhausts itself that we may live. The coal that saves us 
from the winter blast has meant the death of a tree in 
some far away age. The flocks give their wool for our 
clothing and the herds their flesh for our meat. And 



MEANING OF CHRIST'S COMING 73 

our fellowmen, even in distant climes, are toiling and 
sweating and dying that we may be ser^-ed with the ne- 
cessities and comforts of life. Ever>- mother knows 
what the atonement means, for she freely suffers the 
ver\- agonies of death that her babe may b-e given to the 
world. Ever}' patriot knows it. The bloody footprints 
left by Washington's ragged soldiers in the snows of Val- 
ley Forge speak to us the same truth of vicarious suffer- 
ing. Those patriots bled and died that we might be 
given the blessings of libert\\ 

So God was but moving in line with the universe which 
He Himself had made when He was "in Christ reconcil- 
ing the world unto Himself." "He who knew no sin 
was made sin for us.'' '"He " ::r- :ur sins in His own 
body on the tree." "He was wounded for our trans- 
gressions. He was bruised for our iniquities: the chas- 
tisement of our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes 
we are healed." 

THE CREATOR OF CHARACTER 

But glorious and satisfying as this blessed truth is, 
it does not exhaust the meaning of Christ's entrance into 
the world as its spiritual King. He came also as the 
Creator of character. 

Salvation is something more than the act of recon- 
ciliation between God and man. Justification is not its 
end, but only its beginning. The decree of God by which 
He forgives us and declares us justified is only the start- 
ing point of a A.'ital process of sanctification which ulti- 
mates through the power of the Holy Spirit in a trans- 
formed life. The righteousness which Gods imputes 
to us for Jesus' sake is to h<e realized in us through a 
growth in grace and the knowledge of the Lord. And 
if it stops short of that it is futile and vain. 



74 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

We are not saved by a system of theology. The world 
is rightfully impatient with that type of religion which 
satisfies itself with mere mental assent to doctrine; which 
is content with formal worship in the sanctuary and 
conformity to ordinjances; and which exhausts itself 
with pious forms and feelings on Sunday and then lives 
through the remainder of the week without God as the 
directing Power in the life. Jesus poured out the hot- 
test vials of His wrath upon the religionists of His own 
day who kept the strictest letter of the law and yet vio- 
lated its essential spirit — who were devoted to form, but 
devoid of life. 

He came into the world to transform men as well as 
to proclaim salvation. We see it exactly illustrated in 
His meeting with Zaccheus. This man was a publican 
and sinner — sordid and unjust. But he obeyed the call 
of Jesus and followed him* joyfully. And the Master 
said: "This day is salvation come to this house.'' But 
that is not all of the story. For Zaccheus stood and 
said unto the Lord: ''Behold, Lord, the half of my goods 
I give to the poor; and if I have taken anything from 
any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold." 
Before he knew Jesus he was narrow, small of soul as 
well as of stature, mean, selfish and grasping — grind- 
ing the faces of God's poor to satisfy his lust for gold. 
But he met Jesus and answered His call, and stood forth, 
tall and white and broad and noble — a transformed man, 
with honesty, justice and thrice-blessed charity singing 
in his heart. Christianity is to be a vital force in the 
daily life or it is nothing at all. It is not primarily pro- 
fession, but performance. Above all things, Christ hates 
a hypocrite. The Christian has something to say, but 
more to do. We modern Christians have overtalked our- 
selves, and now it is high time that we became the saviours 
of humanity! Emerson asks with fine scorn: "How 



MEANING OF CHRIST'S COMING 75 

can I hear \yhat you say, when what you are is thunder- 
ing so loudly in my ears?" The world to-day is asking 
that of all our churches, and we wiU do well to heed. 
Christianit)' is not merely a tire-escape from future woe, 
Jesus came not only to get more men into heaven, but 
also more heaven into men! 

And this divine, miraculous power by which Christ 
transforms a life is the only force which is equal to 
that task. ^Ir. Harold Begbie, in those wonderful books 
''Souls in Action" and ''Twice Born ^len," tells us the 
thrilling stor\- of the modem miracles of divine grace 
in the slums of London. He tells us how the punchers 
and the drunkards and the harlots of that metropolis 
are being cbxanged b\' the power of Christ through the 
work of the Salvation Army from coarse, brutal, bestial 
lives into gentle, pure and noble characters — miracles 
as wonderful and blessed as those witnessed on the day 
of Pentecost. And then he truly says: ''Christianity is 
the only power which can change a radically had man 
into a radically good man/' 

THE WARFARE AGAIXST BAD ENM:R0NMEXT 

It should be said, however, that while Christ has this 
miraculous power. He is not indifferent to the bad social 
and economic conditions which danm men and destroy 
character. In the account of His triumphal entry into 
Jerusalem, we are told that the rulers were ''sorely dis- 
pleased with Him" — so much so that they finally put 
Him to death. 

And Christ has His quarrel with the bad social and 
political conditions of our own age. He is offensive 
to many of the "rulers" of to-day, and they are more 
offensive to Him. His principles are inexorably opposed 
to those public abuses that sanction and protect evil and 



7^ THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

thus prostitute the people and undermine their moral 
fiber. The ministry and church of Christ are traitors 
to their trust, they are recreant to their duty, unless they 
cry aloud and spare not — unless they battle heroically 
against such evils as unjust wages, especially to women 
workers, child labor, the hell-black social evil, lawless-^ 
ness, and the awful shame and disgrace of the liquor 
traffic! 

Note again that Christ came to disturb bad business 
conditions. With unutterable scorn He lashed the 
money-changers from the Temple. Though His mission 
was to be one of meekness and peace. He nevertheless 
would not sanction any compromise with iniquity. His 
was not to be the peace purchased at the price of sub- 
jection to evil, but rather that peace which is to finally 
prevail through the overthrow and destruction of evil. 

Such evils have always existed, but Christ came to 
destroy them that the individual might be saved from 
forces which make for his moral undoing. And we 
have no greater or more imperative duty to-day than to 
take up Christ's whip of small cords and scourge the 
dishonest money-changers from the temple of modem 
civilization ! 

NO MORBID VIEWS OF THE PRESENT WORLD 

One other word, however, needs to be said here. 
Christ came to transform men and to better their earthly 
environment. But he did not come to champion any 
morbid views of life. A long face and a pious heart are 
not necessarily correlates. To cultivate funereal tones 
and abject manners is really to caricature Christianity. 
For the Master came to bring happiness, joy and peace 
to the world. He was no advocate of pessimism and 
renunciation. Rather was He a hearty champion of the 



MEANING OF CHRISTS COMING 77 

right use of every harmless and helpful force of life. 
How genuine and manly was His piety! How well- 
rounded, sane and wholesome was His life! Some of 
our so-called 'liberaF' writers have recently compared 
Buddhism and Christianity. They have pointed out what 
they are pleased to term the points of similarity between 
the two religions. They have said to us that Buddha 
was a pure and good man, just as Jesus was, and that 
much of his teaching is high, holy and helpful; and 
they would have us believe, therefore, that there is not 
such a crying need for missionary endeavor, especially 
in the Orient, as we have been accustomed to suppose. 
What a colossal error is here! For despite any surface 
and incidental points of resemblance, there are no two 
religions of earth so radically different from each other 
as are Buddhism and Christianity. They are as wide 
as the poles apart. One is the religion of despair, the 
other is the religion of hope; one is the religion of 
stagnation, the other of progress; one is the gate to 
death, the other is the way of life. '^To the sick and 
dying soul of the human race Buddhism comes as a 
Job's comforter; Christianity as a healing physician. 
Buddhism diagnoses the disease and gives it a name; 
Christianity cures it. Buddhism explains why the pa- 
tient should bear his sufferings and remain patient under 
his afflictions ; Christianity commands him to take up his 
bed and walk/' 

Budda said there is no good thing upon earth, and no 
hope for human life. Therefore, the part of wisdom 
is to endure the earth only so long as we must, and to 
escape from life as early as we may. Buddha said throttle 
every desire, and you shall have peace. Lay violent 
hands upon every natural impulse of mind and flesh and 
destroy them, until you are willing to live in a dark 
cave, to sit in sackcloth and ashes, and to eat day by 



78 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

day but a crust of bread. Do this, said Buddha, and 
by this extinction of desire you shall reach the heights 
of inner peace, and at death enter into Nirvana — the 
bliss of annihilation. But in opposition to all of this 
the ringing voice of Jesus sounds down the ages saying, 
"I am come that they may have life, and that they may 
have it more abundantly.'' Jesus says do not throttle 
your desires, but purify them and consecrate every power 
of body, mind and soul to God! And that program of 
Christ's means not the stagnation, suffering, sin, despair 
and death of India and China, but the progress, com- 
fort and enlightenment of Europe and America. In the 
teaching of Christ there is room for science, and art, and 
education, and sanitation, and progress, until at last the 
end shall be not death, but life; not annihilation, but 
heaven! 

THE GUARANTOR OF ETERNAL LIFE 

This leads us to the crowning meaning of Christ^S 
coming to this world — His mission as the Guarantor of 
eternal life. 

The bright picture of the triumphal entry is darkened 
at its close by shadow and storm. 

"Hushed were the glad hosannahs 
The little children sang." 

We behold Him who had entered the Holy City sur- 
rounded with such joy and brightness now spat upon, 
buffetted, scorned and rejected. We see the bloody sweat 
of Gethsemane and the crown of thorns pressed down 
upon His lovely brow. And as the heavens are darkened 
and the earth quakes with sympathetic horror, we hear 
the agonized cry wrung from the broken heart of the 



MEANING OF CHRIST'S COMING 79 

Son of God upon the Cross. We might then turn away 
in sorrow with the dispirited disciples, for seemingly 
that is the end of it all. The bright dream is over, and 
death appears to have won his supreme victory. One 
of the old masters has painted a picture of the Crucifixion 
which expresses this mood of the Cross. Shadows, dark 
and terrible, are over all the earth. The forms of the 
bystanders are but faintly seen through the gloom. Only 
one ray of light falls from heaven, and that strikes 
the face of Christ, with its expression of rejected love, 
and then falls beyond the Cross where an ass is eating 
one of the withered palm branches which the people 
had waved before Him only a few days before. How 
tragic and terrible if we had to stop there ! How piercing 
the pathos that the palm leaves thus had withered! 

But, thank God, we do not have to stop there! An- 
other master has painted the picture of the resurrec- 
tion, where the white angels of God stand and say, ''Why 
seek ye the living among the dead? He is not here! 
He has arisen!" And across the gloom of earth's sor- 
rows for two thousand years has streamed this radiance 
from the tomb of the risen Christ! Men have ever 
dreamed of immortality, but they have not known. The 
intuitive faith of the race has groped toward this mighty 
truth, but it has lacked assurance. Never down the ages 
has a loved one been laid beneath the sod but ''hope 
has seen a star and faith has heard the rustle of a wing" ; 
and yet in the dumb agony of uncertainty loved ones left 
behind have turned their tear-dim.med faces from the 
graves of their dead! But Jesus has changed all of that. 
He "brought life and immortality to light." He has 
taken the truth of the hereafter out of the realm of 
speculation and brought it forth into the clear light of 
the real. Beneath the fond hopes and the intuitive faith 



8o THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

of the race, He has put the firm foundation of certainty 
by the liisforic fact of His own resurrection. 

With the weird and fascinating beauty of his pessi- 
mism and despair, Omar Khayyam voiced the skepticism 

which has ever met the intuitive faith of men bv asking": 

**Strange, is it not? that of the myriads who 
Before us passed the door of darkness through. 

No one returns to tell us of the Road, 
Which to discover we must travel, too." 

He asks it, and for ages it could not be answered. But 
now we can answer it! And here is the answer: ''Now 
hath Christ been raised from the dead — the first fruits 
of them that are asleep." In the good mercy and the 
loving care of God, One has lighted the dark door of 
death, and journeyed back to tell us of the Road we. 
too, must take. By His triumph over death and the 
grave, Christ has become to us the Guarantor of eternal 
life. ''He was offered up for our offenses and raised 
again for our justification*' — "the first fruits of them 
that are asleep." Just as the first flower of spring is 
the prophecy of the blushing beauty that shall deck all 
the hills and fields and valleys, and as the first ripe 
peach of summer is the promise of the mellow perfection 
that shall spread over all the orchards until every tree 
is laden with luscious fruit, so the resurrection of Christ 
is the prophecy and promise that to all whose bodies now 
sleep in the earth or under the sea shall come the visita- 
tion of God's power that shall raise them up, transformed 
and glorified, into the image of the risen Lord. 

In the inspiration of this blessed truth we can meet 
our end without a tremor, and while we linger here be- 
low we can go to the graveyards everywhere and, stand- 
ing above the rolling mounds that shelter the dust of 



MEANING OF CHRIST'S COMING 8i 

our beloved dead, we can exclaim in triumph and not 
despair, "O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is 
thy victory?'' 

Yea, more ! We can meet all the skeptical speculations 
of materiahstic philosophy and all the inhdel doubts of 
unbelievers by the strong, sure words of Jesus: "Let 
not your hearts be troubled : ye believe in God, believe 
also in Me. In INIy Father's house are many mansions ; 
if it were not so, I zvould have told you. I go to prepare 
a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for 
you, I will come again and receive you unto IMyself : 
that where I am. there ye may be also. I am the resur- 
rection and the life: he that believeth in Me, though he 
were dead, yet he shall live; and whosoever liveth and 
believeth in Me shall never die I" Thus before the eye 
of faith— 

"Earth breaks up, time drops away, 
In flows heaven, with its new day 
Of endless life, when He who trod, 
Very man and very God, 
This earth in weakness, shame and pain, 
Dying the death whose signs remain 
Up yonder on the accursed tree — 
Shall come again, no more to be 
Of captivity the thrall — 
But the one God, all in all, 
King of kings. Lord of lords!" 

O'UR CALL TO SE.R\i:CE 

Here, then, oh, friends, is something of the mean- 
ing of Christ's coming into our world. Christ able to 
save, Christ able to transform. Christ able to complete 
human Hfe! This is His mission! 

And may we ask this practical question in closing? 



82 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

If Christ has meant so much to the past, to modern 
civiHzation and to our own individual hearts, then should 
not our efforts be heroically earnest in bringing the 
knowledge of His saving truth to the lost who have 
it not the wide world over? These people in that olden 
time cast before Him their palm leaves and their gar- 
ments, and hailed Him with joyful hosannahs. And 
should not we, redeemed by His blood, given peace with 
God through His sufferings, purified by His spirit, in- 
spired by the blessed hope of heaven, which He alone 
can bring — should not we cast before Him our talents, 
our time, our money and our lives, that He may be 
glorified and His saving truth may be brought to all 
the needy children of men, until — 

^The gospel banner wide unfurled 
Shall wave in triumph o'er the world, 
And every creature, bond and free, 
Shall hail the glorious jubilee," 



CHAPTER VII 

THE MIRACLE AND THE MEANING OF THE 
TRANSFIGURATION * 

Text: "And was transfigured before them: and his face did 
shine as the sun, and his raiment was white as the light." (Matt. 
17:2.) 

The transfiguration was one of the most remarkable 
events in the earthly life of our Lord, a life filled with 
signs and wonders. Heavenly visitors announced the 
coming of this marvelous being to our earth; at His birth 
other angels came on joyful wing heralding the event 
with songs of gladness; a beautiful star appeared in the 
east, and wise men from far countries journeyed to- His 
manger cradle to bring their gifts of gold, frankincense 
and myrrh. 

Have you ever thought, my friends, that it is not re- 
markable that these unusual things should have occurred? 
It would have been remarkable if something out of the 
ordinary had not occurred. When even an earthly king 
goes visiting there are unusual demonstrations in his 
honor. Should we be surprised, therefore, when the 
King of Glory left His throne on high and came to visit 
our humble earth, that remarkable events should have 
accompanied His earthly walk, and that even sympathetic 
nature showed forth her joy? 

In studying these wonderful incidents in the life of 
Jesus we need to remember just who He was. We need 

* Preached at University of Virginia. 



84 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

to refresh our minds with the great truth that He was 
none other than the Christ — the long-expected Messiah. 
the ever-Hving Logos, the Eternal Word, by whom all 
things were created — through whom ''all things hold to- 
gether," and in whom divine majesty and power were 
incarnate. 

THE MIRACULOUS EVENT 

I hasten to say therefore in the first place, that the 
transfiguration was a miracle, and, consequently, not 
fully comprehensible to our finite minds. I do not blink 
the literal fact of the miracle nor seek to evade it. To 
some a miracle is a monstrosity to the intellect, instead 
of a sign to the heart, as God intended that it should 
be. It seems incomprehensible to a certain type of mind 
that the divine, pre-existent Spirit, who created the V\^orld 
and now sustains it, should intervene in that world, and 
for the furthering of His own wise and beneficent ends, 
operate at times in ways that are beyond our finite 
and limited comprehension. Through the dominance of 
merely materialistic conceptions that do not look deep 
enough to see the spiritual fact behind every material 
form, some are so troubled by the thought of Nature's 
inexorable laws that they fail to apprehend the divine 
personality behind those laws. While congratulating 
themselves upon their own assumed breadth of vision, 
such minds really are the essence of narrowness, because 
they reach their conclusions from premises founded upon 
too narrow data. God is neither an exile from His 
world nor a prisoner locked up in it. Deism made the 
mistake of thinking the former, while pantheism and 
modern rationalism are making the mistake of thinking 
the latter. 

I hold here in my hand a watch. The ''natural law^" 
of that watch is for the hands to go around from left 



MEANING OF TRANSFIGURATION 85 

to right, and it invariably operates in that way when left 
to itself. But I)y pulling out this little stem at the top 
of the watch I can move the hands backward from right 
to left, and start them and stop them at will; and in 
doing that I have neither violated nor destroyed the 
natural law of the watch. I have simply intervened with 
the power of m.y superior personality and, through the 
operation of another set of laws higher than those that 
usually operate the watch, I have moved the hands 
in a direction contrary to that which their ''natural law'' 
invariably carries them. 

Seen in true perspective, the greatest fact in the uni- 
verse is not the fact of bhnd law, but of sentient per- 
sonality. A farmer was once arguing with a skeptical 
traveling man from the city. They were standing in 
the village store and quite a crowd had gathered to hear 
the discussion. The farmer was whitthng with a large 
jack-knife, and the skeptic, in the course of his argu- 
ment, proclaiming the universality of natural law and 
blind force, challenged the farmer by saying, ''Do you 
mean to tell me that if you turn that knife loose it can 
go in any direction except downward to the floor in obedi- 
ence to. the lav/ of gravitation?" The farmer answered: 
''Yes, I will assert that." Whereupon he turned the knife 
loose, giving 'it a little flip upvv^ard with his finger, how- 
ever, as he released it, and the blade stuck in the ceiling 
overhead and the knife hung firmly there. What had he 
done? Had he violated the attraction of gravitation? 
By no means. If he had done that, he v^ouid have 
wrecked the entire solar system. By the intervention 
of the will resident in his personality he had simiply 
brought into play another lav/ which enabled him to 
perform v/hat was in essence a miracle, as measured 
solely from the standpoint of the operation of the at- 
traction of gravitation. Once m.ore let us see it — the 



86 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

fundamental fact in this universe is not dead matter or 
blind force, or the laws through which they function, 
but personality expressing itself in finite forms in the 
intellect, affections and will of men, and reaching up for 
its full and final expresssion in the divine and eternal 
God! 

"We are broken lights of Thee, 
And Thou, O God, art more than we." 

The transfiguration, then, w^as a miracle from the 
human viewpoint, but doubtless a thoroughly natural 
phenomenon from the divine viewpoint. We cannot ex- 
plain the ''how'' of the miracle. We cannot explain the 
miracle of the ''X-ray" — that transfiguration of elec- 
tricity by which its subtle and penetrating light shines 
through opaque substances — transforming them until 
even they "shine with the brightness of the sun and be- 
come white as the light." We cannot explain the miracle 
of radium — that transfiguration of matter by which it 
diffuses its mysterious and healing rays through stone 
and steel and human fiesh, until they are vibrant and 
aglow with beneficent power. 

So of the transfiguration. We cannot explain how 
the Spirit of Christ — "who is light, and in whom there 
is no darkness at all" — the Spirit who, for man's re- 
demption, put on the garment of humanity, shone out 
through the veil of flesh until He appeared before them 
in "the glory which He had with the Father before the 
world was." All that we know about the "how" of the 
miracle is that it was born of prayer. Luke tells us 
in his version of the incident that "as He was praying 
the fashion of His countenance was altered and His 
raiment became white and dazzling." We know, too, 
that there is always something of a transfiguring power 



i 



MEANING OF TRANSFIGURATION 87 

in true prayer. The old masters have made no mistake 
in painting the faces of the saints with a mysterious 
halo. Some of us, even in this prosaic twentieth centur\% 
have caught a passing ghmpse of the "light ne'er seen 
on land or sea" upon the faces of our mothers or our 
fathers, or a saintly pastor or friend, in some moment 
of high spiritual enthusiasm and heavenly vision, as they 
communed with God in prayer. A\'e do not understand 
the connection between the soul and the body. \\'e can- 
not fathom the subtle and mysterious ties by which they 
are united. But certain it is that as Jesus of Nazareth 
stood in rapt devotion and communion with God upon 
the mountainside. His divine spirit shone out through the 
flesh imtil He stood transfigured and glorified before His 
wondering and worshiping disciples. 

THE PURPOSE OF THIS MIR-\CULOUS EVENT 

In studying this miraculous and glorious event let us 
notice next its purpose. There is no miracle without a 
purpose, and this one came at a most significant time. 
The great Gallilean ministry' of our blaster was drawing 
to its close. ^lany mighty works had been performed. 
Much good had been accomplished. The misssion of 
Jesus of Nazareth as a teacher of truth was just about 
completed. His higher mission as a sacrifice for the sins 
of a lost world was just about to be fulfilled. 

It had been recognized at last who Jesus was. Only 
six days before the transfiguration, in reply to a direct 
question which He himself asked, Peter had said, "Thou 
art the Christ, the Son of the living God." Immediately 
after that, however, w^e are old that ''from that time 
forth began Jesus to show unto His disciples how that 
He must go unto Jerusalem and suft'er many things of 
the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed.'' 



88 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Here, then, to the disciples was a puzzling and contra- 
dictory thing. On one hand the disclosure of the divine 
Messiah — the one for whom they had so passionately 
longed — on the other hand the prophecy of a disgrace- 
ful and ignominious death for that Messiah on a Roman 
cross! They could not understand that contradiction. 
But Jesus knew. He knew that He must not only live 
for truth, but that He was to- die for human redemption. 

Thus, with the disciples puzzling over these things on 
one side, and on the other Jesus facing the awful fact 
that "His hour" was near at hand, came the transfigura- 
tion, with its wonderful lessons and its strengthening 
influences upon them all. 

Was not the purpose of the transfiguration, then, as 
related to Jesus Himself, to prepare Him for His ap- 
proaching passion and death ? An early tradition tells us 
that Jesus as a boy was one day working in the carpenter 
shop at Nazareth. He was lifting a beam of wood. The 
evening sunlight was streaming through the windows be- 
hind Him, and its rays threw before His startled eyes^ 
the figure of a cross on the floor before Him, made by 
the shadow of His body and His outstretched arms. All 
His life through, that cross had loomed clearer and 
clearer before Him, and now He stood at last in its very 
shadow. Within the next few days His friends were to 
betray Him — His foes were to triumph over Him, and 
He was to pass through the agony of the garden and 
the supreme anguish of the cross. 

And think not, oh, friends, that because He was divine 
He did not need sympathy and encouragement for the 
carrying of these grievous burdens. Though divine. He 
was also perfectly human, and therefore fully conscious 
of every human need and capable of every human suffer- 
ing. At the tomb of His friend Lazarus we behold him 
with tears of sympathy upon His cheek; and upon another 



MEANING OF TRANSFIGURATION S9 



occ::i5::: 
love- : 

burden 



glory and. as 1 r r A: us, '^spoke of His dec 
He vr: ? Ah at Jerusalem." 

bring: is :: -is?.ees of comfort 

Ar:l .-:.:::^ :: u:- di^riples, and throtic 

all after a^-es. v.-as not the purpose c: :'us r': 
:: r:-::::Av :.:A -:abUsh th. ■-::•-.---: I:: Ah 



Or eve 



yoke and : - : :5V :vr : : A sra^' j^rd 

as Jesus A :: ir : i ir vu pr- 



victories. tot : v A l :: ivvrr 000 to faiL Butnc :v:::e 

thisthr::::uo a:A o::::v,-v r::;-:r:tv:e -voto thev eov- Hun 

in traus:-u;'Tu: so:". ur:/,uuv.- Ot^u:/. Avvu:^-'" says :uat 



toe pure wmte c: tvr suuv; i^uut saps "'.■autr au:. aaz- 

of sncvr. aud the ruajesty c: toe upuuuup. As' -viuier 
that that v:s::u a: surerual atauty thra:^! aaa reassur-d 
them! Nc wuatr taa: Aau, :uau-.- v-s.rs u.:-, v;::-: 
'^Webehe'a Hi, ar c^arv a. af :uc a a a bc^itcu fran 



90 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

the Father" (John 1:14); and Peter exclaimed in his 
old age and in his very last epistle, ''We were eye- 
witness of His majesty . . . when we were with Him 
in the holy mount"' (11 Peter i :i6-i8). 

They saw Him in the beneficent splendor of a light 
like the sun, glistening with the purity of a whiteness 
like that of the undriven snow, and flaming with the mag- 
nificent beauty of the lightning as it flashes its radiance 
across the dark bosom of the storm. They saw Him there 
as God's perfect man and man's true God. In that high 
moment of the supremacy of the spirit over the flesh, 
they saw Him as a revelation of what all humanity would 
have been if sin had never entered the world, and as a 
prophecy of what men will be hereafter through His 
transforming and transfiguring power ! 

Surely such a being as that had the right to speak to 
them and to us with the voice of authority! And so, 
''Behold a bright cloud overshadowed them, and behold 
a voice out of the cloud which said, This is my beloved 
Son in whom I am well pleased; hear ye Him.' " 

*'Hear ye Him!'' Above the voice of ]\Ioses, the rep- 
resentative of the old law, above the voice of Elijah, the 
representative of the old prophecy, was henceforth to be 
heard the voice of Jesus, the new Lawgiver and the 
Prophet of a better dispensation. 

The greatest question at last of this age, in both church 
and State, is the question of authority. Is authority in 
the State inherent in some autocrat imposing his arbi- 
trary will upon the masses, or is authority resident in 
the people themselves, as they are led of God, so that 
*'the voice of the people is the voice of God" ? And in 
the realm of religion, is the authority in men, with their 
divergent and conflicting opinions, or is it directly from 
God Himself through Jesus Christ, His Son? In this 



MEANING OF TRANSFIGURATION 91 

majestic incident we find our answer. Here the heavens 
open and the very voice of God is heard exclaiming, 
"Hear ye Him!" Hear not autocracy, however "benevo- 
lent"; not the voice of some church, that presumes with 
its ''councils'' to change the very oracles of God; not the 
voice of ritualism, however stately and venerable; not the 
voice of cold theological dogma, however comprehensive 
and penetrating, but hear the warm, living, loving voice 
of Jesus Christ, as the supreme authority in heaven 
and upon earth ! "Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it/' 
As men have heeded and followed that Voice, the 
world has moved up from darkness to light, from bar- 
barism to civilization, from sin to sanctity, from hate to 
love. As we look upon bleeding Europe to-day, torn and 
shattered and shorn of her glor}', we know that that dark 
tragedy has fallen upon her primarily because she has not 
heard and heeded the voice of the Nazarene. She has 
listened to the clamorous voices of this world. She has 
been wooed by the sirens of kingcraft, state religions, 
and provincial patriotism; and the one and only thing 
that win heal her wounds is for her to bring her sons 
and daughters to the pierced feet of Jesus Christ and 
begin to follow Him. If the time ever dawns upon our 
poor, sorrowing, war-wasted world — that bright and 
beautiful time sung by poets and foretold by prophets 
of old — ^Avhen righteousness and brotherhood shall reign 
upon the earth, when social, political and economic injus- 
tice are overthrown, when universal peace spreads her 
wings above the children of men, when we shall beat our 
swords into pruning hooks and our spears into plow- 
shares, and learn war no more, it will be only when the 
voice of Jesus is supreme, when His love shines as the 
light of every life and when, lifting up our eyes over 
all the earth, humanity sees "no man save Jesus only"! 



92 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

THE LESSONS OF THE TRANSFIGURATION 

May we turn now to inquire what are some of the 
other practical lessons of this sublime and glorious event? 

And one of the outstanding truths of this incident is 
that we cannot all see the visions. Only Peter, James 
and John were permitted to go with our Master to this 
mount of glory. These three seem to have been the spir- 
itual leaders of the twelve. Only these three were al- 
lowed to be present with Christ when He raised Jairus' 
daughter from the dead, and these three alone were called 
to be near Him during His hour of agony in Gethsemane. 
Perhaps only these three had the depth of spiritual vision 
which rendered it possible for them to apprehend the 
transfiguration glories of Christ. But be that as it may. 
only these three were permitted to experience the supreme 
ecstasies of that high hour, while the remainder of the 
disciples were dow^n in the valley with the humdrum 
duties of life. 

And so it seems to be always. We cannot all see the 
visions. We cannot all have the high experiences. We 
cannot all be rich. We cannot all be famous. Alost of 
us have to live out our lives in the valley of the ordinary 
and the commonplace. 

Yet we thank God and take courage in the light of 
the truth that the valley lives are not lost. The disciples 
in the valley were not idle. Their faith had weakened 
somewhat through the absence of their Lord. It is a 
very human touch. They did not have the power to heal 
the demoniac boy, and yet they had at least faith enough 
to bring him to the Master, and He redeemed his life. 

In the Vatican at Rome hangs Raphael's great picture, 
**The Transfiguration." Some art connoisseurs have 
criticized it on the ground that it has two centers of in- 
terest. In the upper part, our Lord is pictured in His 



1 



MEANING OF TRANSFIGURATION 93 

transfiguration glory. On either hand stand [Moses and 
Elijah, and Peter, James and John are kneehng in adora- 
tion before them. In the lower half of the canvas the 
valley is pictured, with the demoniac boy torn by the 

devils, his father with distress written upon his face, and 
the other disciples are pointing hijji upzuard to Christ. 
The art criticism shows a lack of spiritual understanding, 
for Raphael rightly conceived of the mountain height 
experience and the valley serv'ice as one incident. There 
is in the picture, therefore, a profound unity, and it is 
perhaps the greatest canvas ever painted by mortal ge- 
nius. Its spiritual lesson is comfortingly true. We must 
not be satisfied with small achievements, but we can at 
least find encouragement in the fact that the valley life 
has its mission. There is a service that each one may 
render. There is an innuence that the humblest may 
exert. 

This truth but emphasizes, however, the other thought 
— that when the vision is given it is a call to service and 
not for our own selfish enjoyment. The latter was the 
natural and quite human construction which Peter, Jam.es 
and John placed upon the event. AMth their minds and 
hearts thrilling with the wonder of it all. Peter exclaimed, 
"Lord, it is good for us to be here. If Thou wilt, let us 
make here three tabernacles — one for Thee and one for 
Moses and one for Elijah.'' It was as though they said, 
^Tord, let us not go back to the suft'ering and the shame, 
the persecution and the disgrace of the valley. Let us 
stay here in the mountains of this glory, with our hearts 
flooded with this heavenly delight, to enjoy these things 
forever.'' 

But that was not to be. Xor were they to go back 
to the valley and boast. They were not to go down to 
the other disciples and say, ''AA'e have had privileges 
that it was not given you to enjoy. \\'e have been car- 



94 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

ried up to the mountain heights and we have seen the 
]^Jaster in his heavenly glory, and ve met Closes and 
Elijah, and heard the very voice of God Himself." Xo, 
it was for them and for Christ to take the inspiration 
and the strength of the vision on the mountain and carry 
it back for better service in the valley. So we see them. 
immediatelv <yoin'y dovm from the heisihts, healing the 
lunatic boy and serving on until Calvary. 

Loch Katrine, embowered among the highlands of 
Scotland, a poem in water, inrmcrtalized in song and 
story, till it seems almost transfigured with a glcry be- 
yond its natural beauty and charm, is yet the source oi 
the water supply of the city of G-:.sr:w, firviug dcwn 
among the homes of the poor, cleansing the hith from 
the streets, bringing refreshment, cheer, cc mfort. cleanli- 
ness and health everywhere. It does its best work here. 
without detracting from its natural charm among the 
highlands. 

Every unusual experience, every distinctive talent, 
ever}' peculiar gift, every .special blessing, is a call to 
service. Oh, young men of the University, how do you 
interpret your presence here? Do you realize that you 
have been called out from the great multitude of Anreri- 
can youth — one out of a tr.Tv.fr.nd — to drink at the deeper 
fountains of learning and tj enjoy the privileges of a 
higher education? \\'hat will you do with the oppor- 
tunities given you in this :::r. :re:l and noble institution? 
Will you interpret them in terms of mere sr!:-e::" yinent. 
self-advancement, and worldly ambition, cr wih y:u see 
in them all God's call to the service of your fellowmen? 

And in a broader way still does this truth apply. Xot 
to individuals only, but also to nations, the experience of 
the mountain height is a call to service in t::e valley of 
human need. Wt here in America are high upon die 
mountain of a great and blessed civilization. The treas- 



MEANING OF TRANSFIGURATION 95 

ures of all the past are ours. Nature with prodigal 
hand has brought her riches and poured them at our feet. 
Here we are with our wealth and learning and power, 
with our science and our knowledge, with our mighty 
transportation systems, our art galleries, our libraries, 
our magnificent churches, and our great hospitals. Here 
we are with our land peaceful and prosperous, our homes 
comfortable and our children growing up, 

'The heirs of all the ages 
In the foremost files of time." 

Ah, but down yonder is the deep, dark valley of human 
need ! Down yonder are India and x\f rica and China and 
the islands of the sea, still groping in their death shadows, 
still bound by their immemorial bondage, still degraded 
by their unspeakable superstitions, still rotting in their 
bestial immorality, still perishing for lack of vision! 
What have we in Christian America to say to this gigan- 
tic and heart-moving need? Will w^e WTap our comforts 
and our luxuries about us in our favored land and say: 
'Tord, it is good for us to be here''? Or, with great 
gratitude to God for His matchless gifts to us, will we 
turn our faces downward to the path of service, and 
in a really adequate way stretch out our loving hands 
of helpfulness to a lost and sin-cursed world? 

One other lesson would I point you in this inspiring 
incident of the transfiguration, and that is the lesson of 
everlasting life. The way of service is not always the 
way of success, as men count success. The path of Jesus 
led through the valley to the dark horror of Calvary be- 
yond. But further still that pathway led, above the 
cross, to the shining crown ! And never will there be a 
life, either of an individual or a nation, that follows the 
path of ser\-ice that will not reach the heights of full 



96 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

compensation and blessed reward. For the individual, 
the compensations for fidelity and service do not always 
come in this world, and so Jesus taught that whosoever 
will save his life shall lose it, but that whosoever will 
lose his life for His sake shall find it unto life everlasting. 

The blessed reality of that other world of which He 
spoke is made clear in striking and dramatic fashion in 
this incident. Moses and Elijah had passed away hun- 
dreds of years before, but here we find them back from 
the spirit world; not as shadowy wraiths, not as atoms 
of life in some mysterious sea of being, but we find 
them recognizable and recognized by Jesus and the dis- 
ciples. Moses v/as Moses and EHjah was Elijah. Their 
self-conscious personalities had survived in a higher state 
of being, and so close were they to the walks of earth 
that, in the exaltation of that high hour, the scales were 
lifted from the eyes of men and they were permitted to 
look for at least one fleeting moment upon the glories 
of that other land. 

Blessed be God that He has given us. this revelation as 
a sure foundation for our hope ! When the wild bird of 
our northern climate dreams of sunny skies and warm 
waters within the torrid zone, his unerring instinct turns 
him toward the South. Flying on and on, with tireless 
wing, through nights of darkness and days of storm, he 
finds at last his dreams come true; he joins the comrades 
who have gone before and bathes his plumage in the 
warm waters of the Gulf. So to us there come high 
^'intimations of immortality" and a deathless longing for 
a better home than this. In this inspiring incident from 
the life of Jesus we find an adequate foundation for 
our hopes, and we can turn our faces joyfully to the 
stern and splendid call of human service with the full 
assurance that, when the duties of life are over and our 
summons comes, we, too, shall reach that better land, 



MEANING OF TRANSFIGURATION 97 

upon whose blissful shore there falls no shadow and rests 
no stain; where we shall join the loved and the lost 
who have gone before; where we will see Jesus in the 
beauty of His eternal transfiguration, and where we, too, 
shall enter into transfiguration glory; for the promise 
is that He ''shall change our vile bodies, that they may 
be fashioned like unto His glorious body, according to the 
working whereby He is able even to subdue all things 
unto Himself." 

''Soon passed that scene of grandeur; but steadfast, 
changeless, sure. 

Our blest transfiguration is promised to endure; 

The manifested glory of our great Lord to see 

Shall change us to His likeness; as He is, we shall be. 

O Vision all surpassing, filling the heavenly height ! 

The Lamb, once slain, transfigured in the throne rain- 
bow's hght! 

There for endless ages all glorified is He, 

And His eternal glory shall ours forever be !" 



CHAPTER VIII 
DID JESUS ARISE FROM THE DEAD? 

Text: "Now hath Christ been raised from the dead, the first- 
fruits of them that are asleep." (i Cor. 15:20.) 

The resurrection of Christ is a well-established his- 
toric fact. There is scarcely a fact of history that is 
better attested. Let us glance briefly at the evidence. 
To begin with, Christ Himself foretold it. The resurrec- 
tion was not an occurrence that came unexpectedly and 
out of all relation to the past. It was a part of God's 
eternal plan for the redemption of a lost world. The 
Psalmist had sung that God would not leave the soul 
of His Holy One in sheol, nor suffer Him to see corrup- 
tion. And though they did not grasp His meaning Christ 
declared repeatedly to His followers that the third day 
after His death He would rise again. 

That this wonderful prophecy was fulfilled literally 
those same disciples all bore witness. The record of the 
dawn of their faith is full of absorbing interest. One 
who studies the scene at the tomb in John 20 must be 
more and more impressed that the story is honest and 
trustw^orthy. John himself was one of those w^ho en- 
tered that tomb, though with becoming modesty he puts 
himself in the background during the narrative. We are 
told explicitly that before their visit to the tomb that 
Sabbath morning ''The disciples as yet knew not the 
Scriptures that He must rise again from the dead.'' They 
must have approached the tomb, too, with the presup- 

98 



DID JESUS ARISE FROM THE DEAD? 99 

position that the body of Jesus had been stolen away, 
because it is clearly indicated that that was the impres- 
sion which ]Mary had when she turned back and told 
them that the tomb was empty. Yet when they entered 
the tomb they were overwhelmed w4th belief. The rec- 
ord says that they '*saw and believed." Why did they 
believe? Evidently it was the condition within the tomb 
that kindled their faith. John is careful to mention that 
both he and Peter saw the linen cloths in which Jesus had 
been embalmed lying there. 

There was no evidence of disorder or confusion. The 
cloth that had been about the head of Christ was not 
tumbled upon the others, but was seen ''wrapped together 
in a place by itself." A close study of that passage gives 
some ground for the belief that the linen turban was still 
unwound, or still 'Svrapped together" as it had been 
around the head of Jesus, and that the other cloths w^ere 
lying there, also still unwound, like a mold, through 
which the transformed body of our Lord had passed 
like sunlight through crystal. If it were not thus, then 
the cloths had evidently been so carefully taken off as to 
impress upon the beholder the belief that they had been 
laid aside with the deliberation of one disrobing. When 
John and Peter saw the conditions within that tomb they 
believed that Jesus had risen from the dead. The mean- 
ing of His words for the first time camic rushing over 
them, and they stood there in awe and wonder, realizing 
that upon that spot had been performed the crowning 
miracle of the ages^ — the victory over death and the 
grave ! 

THE TIIAXSFORMED DISCIPLES 

The faith thus kindled changed the disciples from a 
group of cowards into a band of heroes. The moral 

transformation wroueht in them bv the resurrection, as 



loo THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

pictured in the New Testament, is one of the wonders 
of history. At the time of Gethsemane and Calvary 
we find the disciples terror-stricken and demoralized. 
Peter, the boldest of them, denied his Lord even with 
curses as he stood warming himself at the fire of his 
Master's deadliest foes. The entire group was scattered 
abroad, hopeless and dispirited, like a flock of sheep with- 
out a shepherd. Then comes the remarkable change 
pictured in the record, and at the time of Pentecost we 
find them back together brave as lions, testifying for their 
Lord, even in the face of persecution and death. That 
same Peter, who had before denied, now stands and 
denounces the Jerusalem mob to their faces, saying, '*Ye 
with your wicked hands have taken and slain Him!'' 
Why the change? How was it that the spiritless cow- 
ards of Gethsemane and Calvary were transformed into 
the lionlike heroes of Pentecost and the early church? 
Why was it that for that precious ''name" they were 
willing to forsake comfort and home and friends and 
native land and go everywhere at infinite cost, preaching 
the truth of Christ with such boldness that, if tradi- 
tion be correct, all of them save one suffered martyrdom 
for their faith? What had wrought this transformation? 
The resurrection had come ! Between Calvary and 
Pentecost that glorious event stands. On no other ground 
can we account for this change in the disciples. The idea 
of a ''spiritual resurrection" is unthinkable, for the spirit 
does not die, and, consequently, cannot be raised. Like- 
wise, such theories as that of "swoons," "apparitions," or 
"a revival of enthusiasm" are all absurd in the light of 
the recorded facts, and especially of this heroic moral 
transformation. No! the angelic visitors had said to 
those disciples, "Why seek ye the living among the dead ? 
He is not here. He hath risen." And they had seen 
His blessed form again. They had looked once more into 



DID JESUS ARISE FROM THE DEAD? loi 

His lovely eyes. They had heard the cadences of His 
gentle voice, and into His wounded side they had thrust 
their hands. Thus, with souls thrilled by that seal of 
God's power upon the work of His chosen One, they went 
forth proclaiming this mighty truth ; for everywhere the 
resurrection became the burden of their preaching. "So 
we preached," said Paul, and "so ye believed." 

From this expression of the apostle just quoted we 
learn the important truth that the fact of the resurrec- 
tion was current history at the time when he wrote this 
letter to the Corinthian church. "So ye believed," he 
says. He is writing here to assure them of their own 
resurrection. To impress this truth he appeals to the 
current belief in the resurrection of Christ, and to 
strengthen their faith he once more recounts the list of 
witnesses. 

*'He was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve : after that 
he was seen of above h\e hundred brethren at once, of 
whom tlie greater part remain unto this day.'' 

But he is careful to add, with touching pathos, that a 
few of the faithful witnesses had ''fallen asleep.'' Then 
he continues : 

^^\fter that he was seen of Tames : then of all the apos- 
tles. And last of all he was seen of me also, as of one 
born out of due time. For I am the least of the apostles, 
that am not meet to be called an apostle, becatise I perse- 
cuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am 
what I am.'' 

With true htimility and deep regret he records that 
he was not with them from the beginning because he 
persecuted the followers of Christ. Xevertheless, by the 
grace of God he was what he was, because on the road 



102 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

to Damascus, even as he went forward to continue his 
persecutions, the risen and glorified Christ appeared to 
him and called him to be an apostle. Just as we cannot 
account for the moral transformation wrought in the 
disciples save by the resurrection, so we cannot account 
for the change in Paul nor for his after life, except on 
the ground that he really saw Christ and talked with 
him, as he declared that he had. 

OTHER HISTORIC INCIDENTS 

In the light of this first-hand testimony we may dare 
the assertion that there is scarcely a fact of world his- 
tory so well authenticated as the resurrection of Christ 
from the dead. We have better proof of it than that the 
battle of Marathon was fought, or that Julius Caesar was 
stabbed to his death. There is no one who says directly 
to us concerning such an event, ^^I saw it." The assas- 
sination of Caesar, like the other outstanding facts of 
history, became a matter of current knowledge at the 
time it occurred, and some time after the event the first 
historian recorded it. And then the record of it comes 
down to us through Plutarch, Gibbon, Merivale and 
others, and we accept the fact on fifth or sixth hand 
testimony. 

But here is a case where a good and true man says, "I 
saw it.'' Not only does the Apostle John tell us how he 
came to believe, as he stood within that empty tomb look- 
ing on the very clothes in which Christ had been 
wrapped; not only does Peter, as reported by Luke, say 
at Pentecost, ''This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof 
we all are witnesses," but this man Paul, in an undisputed 
epistle, written before John's Gospel, and not later than 
twenty-five years after the resurrection, says explicitly 
that he saw the risen Christ. He walked and talked with 



DID JESUS ARISE FROM THE DEAD? 103 

those men who stood in the empty tomb, and who thrust 
their hands into Christ's side, and he also says, *^I saw 
Him/' 

Like the other witnesses, the man who thus testifies 
has tvQTy legal quahfication of a rehable and trustworthy 
witness. He was a man of good character, sound judg- 
ment, with opportunity to learn the facts, and undisputed 
memor}', and instead of any predisposition toward Chris- 
tianity he had the strongest sort of prejudice against it, 
until converted to it by the very thing to which he here 
testifies. If the effort be made to question the authen- 
ticity of the records containing this testimony, it may 
be repHed that they have been amply verified, and that 
any other historic fact might be rendered uncertain by 
the same methods. , 

The resurrection of Jesus Christ is a well-established 
fact. If any one who really examines the evidence does 
not believe it, it is simply because he will not. He has 
to admit by his refusal to believe that there is one class 
of facts which he will not believe, even on the most com- 
petent and overwhelming testimony. This is sometimes 
done, too, in the name of the ''scientific spirit,'' the fun- 
damental contention of which is that all the available 
facts in a given case, regardless of their remarkable char- 
acter, should be admitted as a basis for induction! 

NOT UNREASONABLE IN ITSELF 

We pass on to say that the idea of the resurrection 
is not unreasonable in itself. It is only our carefully 
cultivated habit of questioning which leads us to falter 
at this blessed truth. We are living in a scientific age, 
an age of rationahsm and materialism, and in our in- 
vestigations and our methods of thought we cultivate 
the doubting faculties far more than the believing facul- 



104 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

ties. There is no good reason why we should do this, 
because it tends to. make us one-sided in our thinking. 
Our forefathers easily believed this precious truth, and it 
glorified their lives. Why should not we? There are 
many facts outside the limits of our experience and un- 
derstanding, yet we accept them without difficulty, as 
Tennyson says, ^'Believing where we cannot prove." 
Why not this meaningful and precious truth? Our sci- 
ence teaches us that matter is indestructible. Shall soul, 
the crown of the universe, be destroyed? Young has 
well asked : 

^'Can it be? 

Matter immortal? and shall spirit die? 
Above the nobler, shall the less noble rise? 
Shall man alone, from whom all else revives, 
No resurrection know ? Shall man alone 
Imperial man ! be sown in barren ground. 
Less privileged than the grain, on which he feeds ?'' 

It would seem that, with the wonders of radium, wire- 
less telegraphy and the Roentgen ray, the phenomena of 
which are contrary to many of our former canons of sci- 
ence and philosophy, we ought by now to have a teachable 
humility in regard to the unseen world. 

Jesus said to the rationalists of His day who came to 
Him doubting the resurrection, ''Ye do err, not knowing 
the Scriptures nor the power of God.'' The Apostle 
Paul appeals to the reasonableness of such a faith in 
the light of this same power of God when he asks, ''Why 
should it be thought a thing incredible that God should 
raise the dead?'' Not, note you, that man shoiuld raise 
the dead, but that God should do so. Is not the Lord 
of life the Lord of death as well? Is not the omnipotent 
God, who is the Father of every living soul and who 
sustains our life every moment that we live — is not his 



DID JESUS ARISE FROM THE DEAD? 105 

power equal to the task even of reanimating and trans- 
forming a body which has died ? 



THE PROPHECY OF OUR RESURRECTION 

The resurrection of Christ is the promise and prophecy 
of our own resurrection, and of that of all the countless 
dead. ''God hath both raised up the Lord, and will also 
raise us up by his own power" ( i Cor. 6:14). So the text 
says, ''Now hath Christ been raised from the dead, the 
firstfruits of them that are asleep." Just as the first 
flower of spring is the prophecy of the blushing beauty 
that shall deck all the hills and valleys, and as the first 
ripe peach of summer is the promise of the mellow per- 
fection that shall spread over all the orchard until every 
tree is laden with luscious fruit, so this resurrection of 
Christ came as the firstfruits of all that are asleep. His 
victory over death is the pledge that to every man and 
tvoman whose body now sleeps or shall sleep in the earth 
or under the sea will come this visitation of God's power, 
which shall raise their bodies from the dead. 

Paul says here in Corinthians, "But some man will 
say, 'How are the dead raised up, and with what body 
do they come?' " That is a very natural question. We 
all long to know, yet there are some things which we 
cannot know. We are surrounded on every hand by 
mysteries too profound for our limited minds to fathom. 
Here we are confronted with one of these. Because of 
the limitations of mind and sense in our world of mat- 
ter, we cannot possibly expect to understand the nature 
and conditions of the unseen world of spirits. The m.ost, 
therefore, that even the inspired apostle could say was, 
"Behold, I show you a mystery." 

Yet God always gives us enough to stimulate interest 
and satisfy faith, and our knowledge of Christ's body 



io6 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

sheds some light on the question. There are several in- 
teresting things that we know concerning it. One of 
these is that it appeared to be a normal human body. He 
walked and talked with His friends. He invited them to 
feel His Body, that they might see that He was not merely 
a spirit, and He even partook of food and drink. Yet, 
while He appeared ver}- much the same, we know from 
the record that He was not the same. That there had 
been some remarkable transformation in His body is 
witnessed by the fact that ]\Iary, even, did not recognize 
Him at first when she saw Him standing beside the empty 
tomb; and when the two disciples walked with Him on 
the way to Emmaus they did not recognize Him, though 
their hearts burned within them through contact with 
His wonderful being. Whether His body was changed 
fully at the time of His resurrection or whether it was 
in process of gradual transformation during the forty 
days, or whether He possessed the power of transforming 
His body at will so as to make it immaterial or superior 
to matter, we do not know. We only know that His 
resurrection body had the appearance of the body of a 
man, but at the same time that it had higher and more 
wonderful powers than it before possessed. So we see 
Him passing through closed doors, and coming and go- 
ing in a mysterious and inexplicable manner all during 
the forty days, until at last He ascended into heaven, over- 
coming the attraction of gravitation, yet with a body 
still visible to the eyes of His wondering disciples. He 
was *'the first fruits of them who are asleep." 

''As we have borne the image of the earthly, so shall 
we bear the image of the heavenly, '^ for Christ shall 
''change our vile body that it may be fashioned like unto 
His glorious body, according to the working whereby He 
is able to subdue all things unto Himself/' 



I 



DID JESUS ARISE FROM THE DEAD? 107 

MEANING OF THE RESURRECTION 

It remains to be said that this is a vitally important 
truth, for it is the very heart of the Christian religion. 
Without the resurrection "our preaching is vain, and 
your faith is also vain.'' Take the resurrection out of 
Christianity and there is nothing left save a beautiful 
philosophy, and philosophy does not save lost men. They 
had splendid philosophies before Christ came. The 
Greek mind touched the sublimest heights of thought, 
while Marcus Aurelius and Epictetus, for the Romans, 
gave forth philosophic principles and moral precepts as 
beautiful as many which Christianitv' has. But there is 
one thing which none of these other philosophies or 
reHgions can boast, and that is an empty grave and a 
risen Savior. Without that the meaning and glory of 
our world have faded. Without that our hope is blasted 
and we are still in our sins, for the atonement v/ithout 
the resurrection is meaningless. By the resurrection God 
put his seal of approval upon Christ's work on the cross. 
Death was the result of sin. So if death has not been 
overcome, then sin has not been destroyed. But that sin 
has been destroyed, and the reign of righteousness poten- 
tially established, God *'hath given assurance to all men in 
that he hath raised Christ from the dead." Let us make 
no mistake. We are not saved by the death of Christ. 
By that act we are reconciled to God. A living spirit 
can be saved only by a vital union with a living Savior; 
so Romans 5 :io says. "If when we were enemies we were 
reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more 
being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." 

Thus it was that He was "offered up for our offenses 
and raised again for our justification." "Wherefore, 
He is able also to save them to the uttermost that come 
unto God by Him, seeing He ever liveth to make inter- 
cession for them." 



CHAPTER IX 

THE ONLY WAY OUT FROM ALL OUR 
TROUBLES 

Text: **Who is the image of the invisible God, the first born of 
all creation; for in him were all things created, in the heavens and 
upon the earth, things visible and things invisible, whether thrones 
or dominions or principalities or powers ; all things have been 
created through him, and unto him; and he is before all things, and 
in him all things consist. And he is the head of the body, the 
church : who is the beginning, the first born from the dead ; that in 
all things he might have the pre-eminence." (Colossians 1:15-18) 
(R. V.) 

Each of Paurs epistles has one salient thought. In 
'Romans, it is justification by faith; in Ephesians, it is 
the mystical union of Christ and His church; in Philip- 
pians, it is the joy of Christian progress; in Colossians, 
it is the dignity and the sole sufficiency of Jesus Christ 
as the mediator and the head of all creation and of the 
church. 

How can the strife and the bitterness of to-day be 
banished? Only by the living Christ who is the bond 
of all things. 

The Colossians were suffering from the gnostic 
heresy. The idea behind this heresy was that God, being 
perfectly good, and matter being evil, as they believed, 
God was not directly in the creation. They taught that 
an infinitely perfect and holy being like God could not 
touch or be in immediate contact with something that 
was essentially evil like matter. They therefore con- 
ceived of a series of angelic beings stretching down from 

108 



ONLY WAY OUT OF OUR TROUBLES 109 

God, each lower than the other, until one was gross 
enough to create and animate matter. 

Upon that fundamental idea they built an entire sys- 
tem of philosophy. The word gnostic is from the Greek 
word which means to know. The gnostics claimed that 
they knew and could scientifically demonstrate God and 
His truth. In other words, they were the ''Christian 
Scientists" of their age. 

Like its modern prototype, however, this gnostic 
heresy led to moral decay, because it laid sin on the body. 
They said that the body is matter, which is evil, and 
therefore I am not responsible for what my body does. 
This excused their immorality. 

Now, Paul met all this error and immorality by hold- 
ing up the supreme Christ as the mighty Creator, as the 
only Link between God and the universe, and the only 
Mediator between God and man. Notice, therefore, the 
profound thought of our text. It teaches : 

THE RELATION OF CHRIST TO GOD 

The text says that Christ is ''the image of the invisi- 
ble God." 

The divine Being in Himself is invisible and unap- 
proachable. He is inconceivable to a finite mind and 
therefore unapproachable by a human will. "Who by 
searching can find out God?'' "No man hath seen God 
at any time." 

Christ is the perfect manifestation and image of God. 
Just as ancient kings imprinted their image on their 
coins, so God's image is imprinted on Jesus Christ. 
Therefore we know all that we really know of God, as 
distinguished from what we guess or imagine or suspect, 
only in Christ. Jesus said "He that hath seen me hath 
seen the Father." God is vague and far away until He 



no THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

is brought near to us in Jesus Christ. We may think 
of God in an abstract way as love, but we come to know 
God's love when we see the perfect love of Jesus Christ. 
We may conceive of God philosophically as infinite 
Power, but we know God in His omnipotence and might 
as we behold Christ commanding the forces of nature 
and working those miracles which proved Him supreme 
even over death itself. Hovv^- cold and austere and av/ful 
is the thought of that inscrutable Being Who rules this 
mighty universe, with its unnumbered worlds and its 
immeasurable abysses of space! We tend to falter even 
in the presence of the thought of such a Being, but how 
beautiful and precious God becomes to us as we see His 
image in Christ Jesus, walking the earth ^'full of grace 
and truth." To express it so, we feel ''at home'' with 
God, when we see Him in Christ. Christ brings God 
down to our level. Our text also teaches : 

THE RELATION OF CHRIST TO CREATION 

We are taught here that He is ''the firstborn of all 
creation." He was Himself no creature for He was be- 
fore the creation — "In the beginning was the Word and 
the Word w^as with God, and the Word was God." 
Christ, the eternal Word, is such an emanation from God 
the Father as is conveyed to our minds in the word "Son." 
Christ came by birth and not by creation. Before our 
world was made, Christ was. Hence, He could assert 
His eternal existence by saying "Before Abraham was, 
I am." 

All things, we are taught, were made "in Him." This 
is not pantheism. All things are in Him as seeds are in 
a seed vessel. While not identified with Him, all the 
physical universe takes its origin within the depths of 
His divine nature. He is in and through and yet over it 



ONLY WAY OUT OF OUR TROUBLES in 

all. It makes nature far more precious to us, to realize 
this truth. As we look upon this marvelous world, how 
comforting to know that it was created in Christ, through 
His power and unto Him. There is not a ray of morn- 
ing Hght, not an atom of lowly dust, not a flower lift- 
ing its sweet face to the kisses of the summer sun, not a 
leaf waving in the autumnal air, not a rainbow that 
flashes its beauty across the dark bosom of the storm; 
not a mountain peak, nor a rolling wave, nor a flashing 
star, but speaks of its mighty Creator wath a voice pecu- 
liarly its own. We marvel sometimes at the matchless 
beauty of nature. Now, for example, w^e are in the 
midst of autumn, when nature has drawn her Indian 
shawl about her shoulders and is marching in the pomp of 
crimson and gold, in beauty, to her grave. But need 
we be surprised at these matchless charms? Nature is 
beautiful because it is one expression of the beautiful 
Spirit in w^hich it was created. 

Christ is also the bond of all things. The text says 
*'in Him all things consist.'' The w^ord ''consist" is 
from ''con,'' together, and "sisto," to stand. All things 
stand together, therefore, or hold together in Christ. 
Christ, the eternal \A'ord, was the agency through which 
the original creative act took place. Hence, it is natural 
that He should also be the agency through which takes 
place that continual creation which is the preservation of 
the universe. 

The cohesive force of the world, therefore, is not 
blind "natural law," but Divine personal power. How 
glorious is this truth, and how profound in its meaning! 
What sweetness and what reverential awe such thoughts 
should cast around the outer universe. How blessed 
and reassuring to know that the w^hole course of human 
affairs and all the natural processes are directed by Him 
who died upon the cross. The helm of the universe is 



112 



THE GARDENS OF LIFE 



held by the hands vrhich were pierced for us. The Lord 
of nature and the IMover c: all tl::::g:s is t::o: 'blessed 
Savior to whom we n:ay bring our troubled luiuds and 
on whose breast we may pillow our aching hearts. 

LOVE THE GREAT COHESIVE PO\^'ER 



When it is said that all things were ere: 
bv and unto Christ, and that ::: Ki::: all : 



hold together, what does i: mean : I: is eyaivalcu: 
to saying that all things were created in. :br:ugb and 
unto love. *'''God is love." The manifestation, there- 
fore, of God in human form, was :ne incarnation of 
Divine love. This voarld was created tnr:uon love and, 
therefore, unto good. \Miat a f:un:lat::n f:r true 
optimism! \\'hat a source of strength far victery aver 
every doubt and fear! The material unb.-erse was not 
made for and through and unta f:re- and strife and 
hatred and death. If you g: but de^ro enuagn iota 
nature you wih hnd the profound trutn, udnch tn:^ ar^at 
text is teaching us, that the farces that na^-^ ':: c:- 
operation. harmony and Ozaee are innniteh" 
the forces that make for comaeth::n. strife ana v,a 
If this were not true the imiverse w:ul:l be a cba:s, in- 
stead of a cosmos. The final grab :laercf_na:, c/cu cf 
the material universe, as well as af baanann nls::ry. vill 
be the complete and glorious triumph of love: and in 
this all things will be but realizing the purpose for which 
they were created. 

Xotice now some of the 



an 
re. 



PRACTICAL APPLICATIOXS OF THIS PROFOUND TRUTH 



Domestic life holds together only through Christ. 
The terrible record of divorces in recent years means 



ONLY WAY OUT OF OUR TROUBLES 113 

simply that the Christ spirit of unselfishness and love 
has been lost from both sides. It means that Christ no 
longer reigns in the hearts of husbands and wives whose 
homes have been broken up and frequently whose little 
children have been set adrift through divorce. Every 
true love match is made in Heaven, and therefore mar- 
riage is the holiest relationship of earthly life. When 
we lose heavenly love from our human hearts, then 
wreck and ruin comes to domestic happiness and peace, 
and the divorce court is the tragic and disgraceful end 
of the sorry story. 

In his remarkable book 'The Cage," Harold Begbie 
gives a powerful illustration of this need of Christ in 
domestic life. The story pictures, in the heroine, a pure 
sweet woman, one who is entirely ''good," but one with- 
out religion, hence adrift without a Guide. Her husband 
also is without religion, and after the first novelty of 
their new relationship has worn off, he begins to drift 
into alienation and toward marital infidelity and sin. 
The story then unfolds, and his wife finds Christ; she 
is truly converted. She is given a new heart and, through 
Christ's revelation of His love and powxr, she comes 
to her true self; she reaches serenity of soul; finds per- 
fect happiness, and wins back her husband. 

A short time ago, I left the city in an automobile, 
and while driving along a country road, just at dusk, I 
saw through the window of a home a farmer and his 
family kneeling around the fireside engaged in evening 
prayers. The open Bible was lying in the seat of the 
chair before which the husband and father knelt. His 
face was lighted with divine beauty, as he poured out 
his soul in prayer to God, as husband, father, and high- 
priest of his home. His little children were kneeling 
also reverently in a circle around him, and the sweet- 
faced wife and mother, with an expression of heavenly 



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114 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

calm upon her countenance, was t::ere. 

beauty of that picture :: d::::es::c c: 

and love. I could not fail to co:::c:,r; 

the scenes of godlessness. self-will a:::! 

we see on ever\' side in the city. The 

struction of divorce never c::::e v;:: 

wife are upon their knee?. The n-;\hn~ c: :::e nnnrns 

is in the home life c: :::e "^tiz'-z. :.:\i :n!y Chris: can 

make our homes what the)^ oug::: :: be. 

Organized society also holds rrgether :n:y :hr:ngh 
Christ and the love in which and nn:: v. •::::/. :hh^ v.crld 
was made. Here is the real ',<ty ::■ :::e cin:cuhnes L»e- 
tvveen labor and capital. 

Here, my friends, is the fundamental trouble in the 
industrial world to-day: There is selnslmess on both 
sides. The love w^hich is the elemental, cohesive power 
of the world is lacking. What do all of the McXamaras, 
these red-handed anarchists, and these prea:':ers :: strife 
between class and class, really signify- 'h .,a: :i: :hese 
bursting bombs and these mutilated ::aies and this 
bloody strife mean? All things li:-n :: rirces ::r 
lack of love! All things tearing asur.irr h- cause :::e 
Christ "in whom all things consist*' is ::rg:::rn. 

Selfishness also is seen upon the side of cap i:aii5:s. 
Millionaire highwaymen who loot railway systen:s. and 
the profiteers who to-day are plundering the perric ah 
prove it so! Whence came these sinister and u::i : .ciy 
figures which our modem materialistic life lias devel- 
oped? They have appeared upon the stage of rime to 
harm us because they have lost Christ. His love alone 
is the bond of all things, and never until both capital 
and labor bow^ again at the foot of His cross and receive 
His spirit of true brotherhood and unselfishness and 
love, can there be any real industrial peace. Councils, 
conferences, committees, strikes, and lockouts will bring 



ONLY WAY OUT OF OUR TROUBLES 115 

us nowhere. Christ is the only hope. He is the "Door/' 
and He is the only way out of all our troubles to-day! 

Free government holds together only in Christ and 
His love. 

We have to-day the spectacle of corrupt and selfish 
politicians preying on the body social instead of loving 
and serving it. \\q see it also w^ithin the masses of the 
people — the tendency to split up into little selfish groups, 
circles and ''classes." Modern societ}^ is sick because 
love has been lost. 

This truth also applies to international relationships. 

Selfishness, at last, is the mainspring of war. What 
did the boom of the ''Busy Berthas" mean? It meant 
simply all things tearing asunder because love was lost. 
Modern materialism has produced practical infidelity. 
The spirit of Jesus Christ has been banished from the 
individual heart and the council halls of the nations, and 
the result is war and blood and destruction. All things 
bursting asunder instead of holding together, because the 
bond of unity, which is the love of God in Christ Jesus 
our Lord, has been lost. The most discouraging fact 
of modern history^ is the fact that the peace conference 
at Versailles deliberately refused to open its sessions 
with prayer or to give any recognition to God in the 
covenant of the proposed League of Nations. Unless 
love is in our hearts with the spirit of justice and right- 
eousness that flows from it, no League of Nations nor 
all of the efforts of our statesmanship will avail to save 
us from a yet deeper descent into the inferno of strife 
and war. Jesus Christ is the world's Savior, and until 
we re-enthrone Him and come back to His cross there 
is no help. We are like children crying in the night "and 
w^th no language save a cry,'' until we step out into 
His glorious light. 

The church holds together only in and through Christ- 



ii6 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

^'He is the head of the body, the church, who is the be- 
ginning, the first born from the dead." The risen and 
now Hving Christ is the Head of the church, and 
spiritual hfe flows into the body of the church only 
through Him. If we close the channels, and His love 
is not in us, all things go to pieces. Magnificent build- 
ings and venerable rituals and matchless music and elo- 
quent preaching are of no avail unless love is there. 
^'Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, 
and have not love, I am as sounding brass and a clanging 
cymbal.'' 

\\*hat a solemn responsibility rests upon the cnurch 
to-day. The church is the guardian of God's truth. Her 
preachers, therefore, should proclaim God's truth to the 
lost souls of men. We are running to-day after a thou- 
sand man-made plans for ''social salvation" : when the 
Word of God is telling us that there is only one plan 
and that is Christ as ''the wisdom of God and the power 
of God.'' The preachers of to-day are putting entirely 
too much time and strength on side issues and incidental 
things. V\'e mtist come back to the great funda- 
mentals. The supreme need of these times is the plain 
proclamation of divine truth by fearless prophets of 
God. The trouble is that many preachers to-day are 
trying to heal the awful sore of human sin with soothing 
syrup. They are sprinkling cologne vrater on the putrid 
iniquities of a rebellious race. Wq cannot ''reform" this 
world into the Kingdom of God. The Kingdom of God 
comes onlv bv reo:eneration. Tesus did not sav '*Ye 
must be reformed again," but He did say ''Ye must 
be born again." He also said "except a man be born 
again he cannot see the kingdom of God.'' We cannot 
even "see'' it unless we have a spiritual vision which 
comes only through spiritual birth; and yet some of us 
are imagining that we are going to bring: in the king- 



ONLY WAY OUT OF OUR TROUBLES 117 

dom by wise laws, righteous reformation and the im- 
provement of environment No ! We cannot build a 
good society out of bad men any more than we can 
build a good house out of bad boards. Modern Germany 
has amply proved all of this. She was the most highly 
socialized of all nations. Her cities were clean and 
beautiful; she enjoyed a mar\'elous prosperity; she was 
the most highly educated nation on earth, and yet be- 
neath this surface there was a depth of moral iniquity^ 
which has been the amazement of mankind and the 
disgrace of humanity. Hear me to-night! In Christ 
''all things consist,'' and instead of this tremendous 
proclaiming of reform and mere human betterment, the 
church, through her preachers, needs to lift up before 
the gaze of men the crucified Son of God. The promise 
is ''I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto myself." 
Everj' pulpit in the world, in this hour of humanity's 
supreme anquish, ought to be proclaiming the message 
of love and calling the stunned and dismayed children of 
men back to the divine Christ. This is the only way by 
which a world of sin and selfishness, wandering from its 
designed destiny, can be brought back to the fulfillment 
of its glorious mission, which is the realization of the 
Kingdom of God, in the personal reign of the King of 
love, by whom all things Vv'ere m.ade and in vvhom all 
things hold together. 

At the time of the sinking of the Titanic, one of our 
great American preachers was in Belfast, Ireland. The 
Titanic had been built in Belfast, and there Vv'as a great 
local pride over the might}^ ship. She h^d been heralded 
far and wide as "the unsinkable ship." Sixteen mem- 
bers of one church in Belfast, all skilled mechanics, went 
down with her. The mayor said that Belfast had never 
teen in such grief as that which came over this terrible 
tra^^edv. When the news finallv was verified that the 



ii8 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

gallant ship was certainly lost, so deep was the grief that 
it is said strong men met upon the streets, grasped each 
other's hands, burst into tears, and parted without a 
w^ord. The visiting American preached the Sunday 
after the tragedy in the church to which the sixteen 
members who had been lost belonged. Not only was 
the building packed with people, but on the pulpit were 
lords, bishops, and ministers of all denominations. In 
the audience many new-made widows were sitting, and 
orphans were sobbing on every side. The great preacher 
took as his subject 'The Unsinkable Ship.'' But he did 
not apply that term to the Titanic, which on her first 
voyage had gone out into the Atlantic, crashed into an 
iceberg, carrying her precious cargo of human lives down 
to watery death. No ; the preacher's message was about 
that other ''unsinkable ship" — the frail boat on the sea 
of Galilee, unsinkable because the Master of land and sea 
was asleep on a pillow in the after part of the vessel. 
Thank God He still lives and rides the billows and con- 
trols the storms, and when the children of men take their 
only true Pilot back on board, we will ride out the 
present storms and He will bring the vessel through to 
the fair harbor of our hopes. 






CHAPTER X 
WHO IS GOD? 

Scripture Lesson : "Beloved, let us love one another : for love 
is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth 
God. He that loveth not, knoweth not God; for God is love. In 
this was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God 
sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we might live 
through him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he 
loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. 
Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. 
No man hath seen God at any time. If we love one another, God 
dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us. Hereby know we 
that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his 
Spirit. And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the 
Son to be the Savior of the world. Whosoever shall confess that 
Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God. And 
we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is 
love ; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. 
Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the 
day of judgment : because as he is, so are we in this world. There 
is no fear in love ; but perfect love casteth out fear ; because fear 
hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We 
love him, because he first loved us. If a man say, I love God, and 
hateth his brother, he is a liar : for he that loveth not his brother 
whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? 
And this commandment have we from him. That he who loveth 
God love his brother also." (i John 4:7-21.) 

Text : *'God is love ; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, 
and he in him." (i John 4:16.) 

The age-long question of the human race is, 'Who 
is God?" Men have essayed many answers to this vital 
question. The savage in his untutored ignorance an- 
swered, ''God is power.'' He saw the flash of the 
lightning and heard the thunder's awful roar, and in 
abject terror fell prostrate in the dust, exclaiming, "This 
is God." And very easily the savage passed from this 

119 



I20 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

conception that God is power, to devil worship — in the 
effort to placate this being of awful force. 

Not so very far removed from this conception is the 
conception of modern materialism and rationalism that 
God is merely a ''principle," that He is the "force which 
animates the cosmos." Out of this false view, too, flows 
naturally a philosophy of fatalism, pessimism and de- 
pair. Omar. Khayyam has expressed this philosophy in 
his fascinating but deadly poetry, in which he pictures 
God as a mighty tyrant, heartless and careless, and human 
beings as mere chessmen, that this arbitrary ruler moves 
for a season upon the board, and then throws into the 
closet. But surely there must be possible a deeper vision 
of God than this. 

Others have said, God is wisdom. Thoughtful minds 
have looked out upon the magnificent universe in which 
we live — with its millions of flaming suns and rushing 
planets, with its inimitable distances, and its perfect 
order — and they have said, ''The Being who planned and 
executed this, and who keeps it in such beautiful balance 
surely can best be described by the word Wisdom." So 
the Hebrew Psalmist, gazing up into the starry face of 
the sky, exclaimed in devout rapture, "The heavens de- 
clare the glory of God, and the firmament sheweth his 
handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, and night 
unto night sheweth knowledge." Not that knowledge 
which is a mere static quality, but that knowledge which 
has expressed itself in such marvelous accomplishment 
and achievement that we call it wisdom, for wisdom is 
knowledge in right action. 

But does even this express all of God, or even the 
highest of God? Is there not something deeper yet 
behind both poXver and wisdom that includes both, and 
yet reaches far beyond either? Yes, there is something 
higher, deeper and more glorious yet. 



WHO IS GOD? 121 

THE FUNDAMENTAL FACT 

Not only the Greek mind, with its wonderful philo- 
sophical and ethical insight, but all others who have 
pondered upon the deeper things of life, have felt that 
there must be one fundamental fact that embraces and 
summarizes all other facts in the universe. As our minds 
search for this fundamiental fact, we are struck with 
certain expressions or manifestations of this deeper 
thing which we find on every side. 

One of these expressions is what we call beauty. Dur- 
ing the past summer, I have been privileged to be mxuch 
with nature in the great out-of-doors. On the shores of 
a beautiful lake, embowered in the mountains of New 
York, I have learned new lessons in nature's great school. 

I once heard a master of the platform give a lecture 
on ''Acres of Diamonds," but when a summer breeze 
kisses the lim.pid waters of this lake, which I have grown 
to love, it laughs into square miles of diamonds. I 
have seen the sun rise across the lake w^hen the glow of 
pink upon its bosom was as soft as the blush on a 
woman's cheek. I have seen it again in its placid noon- 
day stillness when it was as many colored and tender 
as the heart of an opal, or a seashell lined with mother- 
of-pearl. I have seen it when a storm w'as sweeping 
its wide expanse, when the white caps were cresting up, 
and it w^as awe-inspiring in its majestic beauty. I have 
seen it when, though the skies were tender and blue, 
occasional cloud shadows would drift across the moun- 
tains and then fall upon the lake, and one's mind, caught 
in a mj^stic spell, would go far, far avv^ay. I have seen 
it in another mood — at midnight — ^^vhen a million stars 
were reflected in its bosom, and our boat seemed floating 
between the radiant glories of two firmaments. I have 
seen it when it was locked in the white embrace of 



122 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

winter, when the lake was a soHd sheet of ice, when the 
mountains were draped in snow, when icicles were gleam- 
ing from the gaunt limbs of the oaks, and feathery white- 
ness frosted the deep green of cedar and fir. I have seen 
it in the tender verdure of the early spring, when the 
rhododendron and the laurel were upon the mountain- 
side, and then in the royal charms of midsummer when 
many a dainty wild flower nodded on its shores. Lost 
in wonder, and thrilled with delight, I have seen it again 
when autumn was drawing her Indian shawl about her 
shoulders — when the mountains were all yellow and 
saffron and scarlet and gold, and the lake mirrored these 
radiant hues, until all the world seemed turned into a 
fairyland. With the pensiveness and the pathos of the 
fall time in my heart, I have watched the autumn leaves 
eddying away with every fitful gust of wind, and have 
heard floating down from high above, the faint cry of 
wild fowl on their far flight to the south. 

*'A haze on the far horizon. 
The blue of an infinite sky. 
The rich ripe tints of the corn fields, 

And wild geese flying high; 
And all over upland and lowland, 

The charm of the goldenrod, — ■ 
Some of us call it Autumn, 
But others call it God !" 

Yes, these beauties in the world around us do speak 
to us of God, and they reveal to us the secret of a great 
tenderness that is at the heart of the world, for beauty is 
harmony, and harmony points to Love. 

THE DUMB CREATURES OF FIELD AND FOREST 

And these revelations that are speaking to us of some 
one fundamental fact — the unifying, controlling Power 



WHO IS GOD? 123 

behind all that is — challenge our attention at still an- 
other point, as we observe nature. I was speaking of 
a certain tenderness at the heart of the world. Now 
this tenderness expresses itself not only in beauty, but 
also in the most practical and helpful way, in connection 
with the very humblest forms of animate life — even the 
insects and the dumb creatures of field and forest. 

I referred, for example, to the falling leaves, but all 
do not fall. Here and there in the torest, even in mid- 
winter, one finds a leaf still holding tenaciously to its 
place on the tree. How did it happen to survive when all 
of its fellows had fallen in the dust? Here is what hap- 
pened. A caterpillar crawled out upon that particular 
leaf, and at the end of the stem where it joined the 
branch, the caterpillar secreted a strong tough glue, that 
glued the leaf securely to the tree. Then that little dumb 
creature crawled back and wrapped himself up in the 
leaf, fastening it securely around his body, and there he 
spent the winter. Who told him that unless he fastened 
the leaf that was to be his home, it too would be 
wrenched off by the wintry wands, and he would fall 
down with the other leaves and die beneath the snow ? 

I have been going to school recently to the birds, also, 
and they, too, have taught me wonderful lessons of this 
tenderness which is at the heart of all nature and life. 
Last summer, at the cottage overlooking the lovely lake, 
we saw^ the little wrens building their nests on the top 
of one of the stone pillars on the front porch, and the 
red-breasted robins making their home in the old apple 
tree above the w^all. They raised their babies, and the 
little mother bird knew just the right moment to push 
them out for a test of their tiny wings. She would even 
fly under them, and bear them up if they tumbled too 
suddenly. And by and by, they flew away and knew what 
to do, and where to go for a living; and all through the 



124 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

long winter, those untutored birds were led to their daily 
bread. 

Who led them? 

And this summer, these birds, which were babies last 
season, came back to build their nests and raise their 
babies. And with what wondrous skill they labored, and 
with what pure devotion they loved ! That little mother 
bird, who last summer, mind you, was a baby, and who 
had never built a nest before, knew just what to do. 
For one thing, she knew just the place for her nest. 
Not on top of the stone pillar where the old home had 
been! No, she must set up housekeeping independently, 
and so she and her lover found the end of a branch in 
the thick vines that cover the stone pillars of the porch. 
They put the nest out where the branch was so slender 
that no slimy snake or prowling, murderous cat could 
get out there to devour their babies. 

They knew, too, just what twigs to gather, with just 
enough bend in them to make the nest round; and then 
they knew just what tough grass to weave inside, and 
how to weave it until it was compact and strong. And 
then they knew just where to go to strip the fine inner 
bark from the trees, and with this they lined their nest 
with down for their babies to lie upon, softer than any 
that our money could buy for the rosy baby within our 
nest. 

Who taught them all that? 

And, now, that the fall is at hand, the birds are no 
longer going singly or in pairs. They are gathering to- 
gether in flocks, and the flocks will combine into large 
and larger groups. They are flying more and eating less, 
thereby reducing weight, and strengthening their wings. 
Thus, they are manifestly getting ready for something 
that they must know by some means is coming to them, 
namely, a long journey south. 



WHO IS GOD? 125 

And now some night soon — always at night, never in 
the daytime, when they might be tempted to fly down 
for food — some night, at the same moment, as though 
moved by some mysterious telepathic mind, they will fly 
upward from the tree, where they have roosted, and then 
with unerring precision, — though in the night, mind you! 
they will start away, flying swiftly due south; not north, 
nor east, nor west, and not even southeast or southwest, 
but due south ; for there. Some one has told them, they 
will find food and warmth and love, while the austere and 
inhospitable north is sheeted in ice and snow. 

Who so teaches *'the fowls of the air?'' and who tells 
them these marvelous secrets? 

And then, next spring, the process will be repeated in 
the south, in the same way, and just at the right time; 
and then something leads them unerringly back to their 
northern home. Some of these birds cross half the 
world to the exact spot where they nested the year be- 
fore. Who teaches them these wonderful lessons of 
distance and direction and geography, that only long 
ages of study and experience have taught the children 
of men? And who guides them unerringly in the way 
when men have to have compasses and telescopes ? And 
who brings them to just the spot where there is food 
and shelter for all? 

Ah, my friends, who but God! And the trouble with 
us is that we do not, like the birds, believe and obey. 
We dismiss the wonderful teachings of the Son of God 
as mere ''ideals." When Jesus says unto us, for example, 
that the very hairs of our heads are numbered, and that 
not even a sparrow falls to the ground without God's 
love and care, we say that that is ''a figure of speech/' 
But Jesus did not so mean it. He was but stating the 
fundamental truth of the universe when He said of the 
fowls of the air, ''Your Heavenly Father feedeth them.'' 



126 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Very beautifully has William Cullen Bryant answered 
the agnosticism and the skepticism which says that these 
marvels of the world are only the result of ^'instinct/' 
or the teachings of ''nature." He pictures the waterfowl 
flying through the upper heavens, and draws from it a 
beautiful lesson of human trust in God: 



"Whither, 'midst falling dew. 

While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, 
Far through their rosy depths dost thou pursue 
Thy solitary way? 

There is a Power whose care 

Teaches thy way along that pathless coast— 

The desert and illimitable air- 
Lone wandering, but not lost. 

AH day thy wings have fanned, 

At that far height, the cold thin atmosphere, 
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land, 

Though the dark night is near. 

And soon that toil shall end ; 

Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest, 
And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend, 

Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest. 

ThouVt gone, the abyss of heaven 

Hath swallowed up thy form ; yet on my heart 
Deeply has sunk the lesson thou hast given, 
. And shall not soon depart. 

He who, from zone to zone. 

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, 
In the long way that I must tread alone. 

Will lead my steps aright/' 



WHO IS GOD? 127 

COOPERATION GREATER THAN COMPETITION 

What does it mean, all of this wonder that we see 
around us? What is this tenderness at the heart of the 
world? What are these voices of beauty and these evi- 
dences of loving care, even over the brute creation? Ah, 
my friends, it means what is taught us also here in this 
other revelation of God, the Bible. It means, in the 
w^ords of our text, that '^God is love/' The fundamental 
fact of this universe is not mere almighty power or per- 
fect wisdom, but infinite, holy love. The universal pres- 
ence of love is the universal presence of God, for ''God 
is love." Therefore, we may substitute the word love 
for the word God, and the 139th Psalm will then say 
unto us : 

*Tf I ascend up into heaven, love is there. 
If I make my bed in the abode of death, love is there^ 
If I take the wings of the morning, 
And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea 
Even there shall love lead me 
And love's right hand shall grasp me. 
If I say the darkness shall overwhelm me 
And the light about me shall be night 
Even the darkness hideth not from love 
But the night illumined by love shineth as the day ; 
The darkness and the light are both alike to love." 

Yes, love is the master w^ord, and love, therefore, is the 
master key in all human relationships. The war question 
will never be settled until love is on the throne. And 
the labor question wall not be settled until love is supreme. 

That modern school of economists Avhich has so much 
to say about ''economic determinism," etc., are retailing 
hurtful heresies. It is not true, as some are saying to- 
day, that self-interest is the great inspirer of industry. 
Love is the true inspirer of industry, for all necessary 



128 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

and honest work is from God. Love for wife and chil- 
dren and home gives strength to the arm and gladness 
to the heart of the laborer, as he toils through the long 
day. His is a part of that patience and devotion which 
are at the heart of the world. V\'hen the ycuthfid 
Erskine was asked hovv' he dared demand a hearing from 
the august judges before whose impatient frown older 
barristers had quailed, he replied: ''1 felt my children 
plucking at my robe and heard them crying to m.e, 'Xow, 
father, is your chance to get us bread 1' '"' Ah, yes, love is 
the inspirer of industn,- ! 

Xor can we fail to see love in nature as well as in men. 
It is a very superficial view of the world which tells us 
that nature is '"'red in tooth and claw.''' This is true 
only of somiC of nature. There is bloodshed and kill- 
ing, because even the brute creation has been affected 
by man s fall, and the 'Svhole creation travaileth together, 
waiting for the manifestation of the Sons of God''' ; and 
yet, even in this fallen state, as we have already shown, 
not all of nature is '^red in tooth and claw." Despite 
our prattle about the ''survival of the fittest," the forces 
which make for union and harmony have always been 
greater than those which make for disunion and strife. 
The fact that we are living in a cosmos instead of a chaos 
is in itself sufficient proof of the truth that the cohesive 
forces are far greater than the disjunctive forces. All 
the way through nature, we see the manifestation of the 
benevolent principle. The sunshine gives itself in golden 
bounty to the earth! The growing grain is made safe 
from the boisterous winds,, because the blades stand to- 
gether, and the ripened grain gives itself as food for 
man. The deer finds safety and plenty not in selfish 
solitary existence, but with the herd. The war-like tiger 
perishes, but the peaceful horse survives : the mother 
gives herself for her baby, the friend lays down his life 



WHO IS GOD? 129 

for his friend, the patriot offers up himself for his coun- 
try, and harmony's glad voice is saying to us all the day 
long, that in the final triumph of the Divine Christ, 'The 
meek shall inherit the earth,'' and ''shall delight them- 
selves in the abundance of peace." 

THE MANIFESTATION OF LOVE 

God, therefore, was but moving in line with that ex- 
pression of Himself that He has made through all of 
nature, and which speaks throughout the universe, when, 
in Jesus Christ, He gave Himself for a lost world. Cal- 
vary was but an expression in time of the eternal fact 
that God is Love. For, note you, love is not an abstrac- 
tion. Love is not some vague impulse floating about in 
the air. Love is an act! Therefore, "God so loved the 
world, that he gave his only begotten son, that whoso- 
ever believeth in him should not perish, but have ever- 
lasting life." 

And here, oh friends, we are introduced to a higher love 
than any which this poor world knows. John says in our 
Scripture lesson, ''Herein is love, not that we loved God, 
but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitia- 
tion for our sins." And Paul teaches us that "God com- 
mendeth his love to us, in that while we were yet sin- 
ners, Christ died for the unrighteous." 

"Herein is love," — just as though the world had never 
known what real love was until Christ hung upon the 
cross! We are unfortunate in that our mother tongue, 
while it is rich and beautiful in many directions, is not 
as varied and rich as was the Greek language in which 
the New Testament was written. We have, for exam- 
ple, but one word for love, while the Greeks had several. 
They had a word that conveyed the idea of that love 
that finds its pleasure in its object, and which, therefore. 



I30 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

is allied with passion, and often even tends toward lust. 
They had another word for that higher type of love 
which is born of relationships, and of virtue, that is 
founded upon mutual moral worth, that rejoices in re- 
ciprocation, and that steadily desires and seeks the in- 
terests of those on whom it is set. This is the love of 
kindred and friends and clan and country. This love 
finds its highest expression in what we would call Chris- 
tian comradeship and fellowship in service.. Such a 
comradeship as Paul pictures, for example, in the i6th 
chapter of Romans, where he calls the roll of thqse noble 
men and v/omen — some of them evidently very plain and 
even ignorant — who had labored with him in the Lord, 
and who for him, ''had laid down their very necks." 

The word love that John is using, however, in this 
epistle is distinct from any of these others. It indicates 
a love of a higher and nobler character than the fore- 
going. This love is not brought about because of any 
beauty, or worth, or merit in the object of its devo- 
tion. It is a love which is higher than any tie of kin- 
ship, tribe or nation, and Vv^hich is not affected by evil 
or ugliness in its object. It loves that which* is unlovely 
and unlovable. It loves even though it is despjitefully 
used. It is a desire for the welfare of the beloved, and 
it knows no limitation as to^ the length- which it will go 
in sacrificing itself on behalf even of the unworthy. It 
is love outrunning love. It expressed itself in the prayer 
of the martyr Stephen, and in the forgiveness of Jesus 
even toward those who were putting Him to death. We 
have its shining portrait drawn by the master hand of 
Paul in the thirteenth chapter of First Corinthians, but 
we find its most beautiful exemplification as we behold 
Christ upon the cross. There was a love higher and 
more glorious than the children of men have ever known. 
Herein is love! A love that, despite rebellion and ugli- 



WHO IS GOD? 131 

ness and sin, reaches down from heaven to earth, and fol- 
lows after sinful men even to the brink of hell itself, to 
surprise the guilty with forgiveness and the fallen with 
hope ! 

Dr. S. D. Gordon tells a touching story, which he has 
well called ''A Picture of God." It is the story of a boy 
in a certain home who had been guilty of grievous wrong- 
doing. The father saw that the boy must be punished. 
Justice and right and the proper training of the boy 
and the good order of the home all demanded it. The 
father said to him, ''My son, for three days your life 
has been an acted lie." And so he told the boy that he 
must sleep in the garret for three nights. The first night 
they sent him off to the garret without a candle and with 
only a quilt. But some way, after the boy had gone, a 
strange hush fell upon the father and mother. They sat 
upon either side of the lamp, but each saw that the other 
was not reading. At last, they retired for the night, and 
far in the dead watches of the night, after tossing and 
turning on sleepless pillows, the father said to the 
mother : 

''Mother, you are not sleeping." "No," said she, 
"husband, I cannot sleep." And then she said, "And 
father, you are not sleeping." "No," said he, "mother, 
I cannot sleep. I am thinking about that poor little fel- 
low all alone up in the dark garret, and I cannot stand 
this. I am going up to him, mother.'' 

And so the father went to the garret and cuddled down 
beside the poor little sobbing form and said : "My boy, 
you have done a great wrong and we do right to punish 
you. But, my boy, father has come up to share it with 
you." And so, clasped thus in each other's arms, father 
and son slept until morning. And each night they went 
to the garret together until the full penalty had been paid. 

In an infinitely higher and greater way than that, God 



132 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

in Christ Jesus put His loving arms around our poor, 
guilty, sinful humanity! **God was in Christ reconciling 
the world unto Himself/* He suffered with us, and thus 
it is that Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the 
law, being made a curse for us. Thus, too, God can be 
just and yet the justifier of him that believeth on Christ 
And so we have received the atonement, and ''being 
justified by faith, we have peace with God through our 
Lord Jesus Christ," as the tpumph of perfect love. 

THE LOGIC OF LOVE 

There is, too, oh, my friends, a very practical applica- 
tion for all of these wonderful and inspiring truths. 
'God is love, and he that dwelleth in love, dwelleth in 
God, and God in him." This teaches that all love is of 
God. Ah, but you say, what about that love which leads 
to lust, and finds its manifestation in selfishness? There 
is no such thing as this. Selfishness and love can no 
more be one than day and night can be one. There is a 
difference as wide as the world between love and lust; 
and it is possible, too, for love to be distorted and misled. 
All love is of God, just as all the bright jewels and the 
m.usic and the art of the world are of God. But these 
good things may be abused, and human and even dia- 
bolical elements may be added to them and finally destroy 
them. When jewels and music and art become ends in 
themselves, and are allowed to come between the soul 
and God, they become sin. And in like manner v/hen 
a love, that in its origin has been pure and heavenly, is 
either prostituted by unholy passion, or when it is so 
exalted that it takes the place of God in the highest esteem 
of our hearts, it may become a curse instead of a blessing. 

This love which is from God, therefore, will manifest 
itself in a pure and noble love for our fellowmen. So 



WHO IS GOD? 133 

John exclaims here, ^'Beloved, if God so loved us, we 
ought also to love one another. If a man say, I love 
God, but hateth his brother, he is a liar ; for he that loveth 
not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love 
God whom he hath not seen?'' (i John 4:11 and 20.) 

Since God has paid such a high price to redeem and 
serve us, if his love is in us, it follows that we will be 
willing to pay a like price to serve our fellowmen. So 
John says, in the third chapter of this epistle: 

*^Hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid 
down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives 
for the brethren. But whoso hath this world's good, 
and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his 
bowels of compassion from him, how dwelleth the love of 
God in him?" 

And John gives us the tremendous and searching truth 
that the possession of this love which serves our fellows 
is a proof of our own regeneration. ^^Hereby know we 
that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given 
us of his Spirit" (4:13). And ''We know that we have 
passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren. 
He that loveth not his brother abideth in death. My 
little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, 
but in deed and in truth" (3 114 and 18). What a solemn 
warning is here, and what a searching challenge to high 
and unselfish endeavor! If we are sitting at ease in Zion, 
therefore, and are indifferent to our fellowmen, or even 
harboring hatred of some of them, and if we are giving 
to God and to the service of our fellows only scraps, 
fragments and fractions of time and money and strength, 
it should cause us gravely to question whether or not we 
have really been born again, born from above, born of 
God who is Love! 



134 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

NO FEAR IN LOVE 

But with that assurance of our salvation which comes 
from the presence of real love in our hearts and lives, 
there will come also great serenity of soul. *'There is no 
fear in love'' (Verse i8), because there is no selfishness 
in it! Fear is always founded on the dread that some- 
thing will be taken away from us, something that we 
cherish and desire to hold on to; but ''perfect love casteth 
out fear, because fear hath torment" (Verse i8). When 
our hearts are filled with love — that love which is God — 
we will be like God, and hence there will be no issue be- 
tween us and our f ellowmen, and no fear to disturb our 
souls. 

It is very significant, therefore, that at the heart of 
this wonderful passage from John's epistle, he introduces 
the thought of the judgment day. He says, ''Herein is 
our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the 
day of judgment, because as He is, 30 are we in this 
world." Mofifett has given a revealing translation of this 
verse. He says, "Love is complete with us when we have 
absolute confidence about the day of judgment, since in 
this world we are living as He lives." If we live, then, 
as Christ lived, surely there will be no fear in us of the 
judgment; but that love which is in Christ, and which 
we may have abiding in us, will cast out all fear, and we 
will have boldness in the day of judgment. 

This tremendous truth of judgment upon ungodli- 
ness and sin, therefore, is a fitting background of aus- 
terity for the beautiful picture of love. True love is 
strong, not weak. It has granite and iron as well as 
music and rose petals in it. Though God is love, God 
is not a moral mush; God is no.t a simpering sentimen- 
talist; God is not a mild mollycoddle! God is our 
Heavenly Father, — not our "Papa" or our "Daddy," but 



WHO IS GOD? 135 

our Father — strong and holy and wise and true ; and be- 
cause He loves us with a perfect love, He will not wink 
at iniquity or pass by sin with indifference! 

Therefore, once more, because sin was judged there, 
Calvary's cross is the supreme expression of this love 
of God w^hich ''passeth all understanding/' It is the 
attractive power of the cross, which is to transform the 
world, for the promise is, 'T, if I be lifted up, will 
draw all men unto myself." 

THE POWER OF LOVE 

Yes, as Henry Drummond said, love is ^'the greatest 
thing in the world/' It annihilates the dross of selfish- 
ness; it transmutes our gross thoughts and ideals into 
something purer, sweeter and more divine. It is a re- 
creating, energy. It smoothes away the wrinkles of age 
and care. It makes the heart ever young. It makes a 
halo in the darkness, and turns even ''the shadow of death 
into the morning." It comes not from mere material 
forms. It is a direct product of the Divine mind. It is 
not a discovery of science. It is a revelation from 
heaven, and it has its seat and center in the bosom of 
God. From that holy fountain, it flows out to change 
our vile personalities into angelic beauty and to water 
every flower of brightness and joy that blooms beside 
the highway of life. 

"In peace, Love tunes the shepherd's reed; 
In war, he mounts the w^arrior's steed; 
In halls, in gay attire is seen; 
In hamlets, dances on the green. 
Love rules the court, the camp, the grove, 
And man below and saints above; 
For love is heaven, and heaven is love." 



136 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Yes, and earth becomes like heaven where love enters 
in. Love glows in the sunlight ; it blossoms in the flower ; 
it breathes in the summer's air; it shines in the rainbow; 
it glistens in the dewdrop; it murmurs in the flowing 
stream; it trills in the melody of the mocking bird; it 
coos in the note of the dove; yea, and it thunders in old 
ocean's storm-tossed wave and gleams in the lightning 
flash as it leaps athwart the dark bosom of the storm. 
Love thrills in the devotion of the patriot's heart; it steels 
the arm of the soldier ; it steadies the martyr as the flame 
consumes his flesh ; it gives courage to the prophet as he 
smites vileness and sin, and comforts him in the hours 
of loneliness which only a prophet knows. It is love that 
prompts all the forces of brotherhood. It trembles in the 
tear of sympathy; it touches with compassion the sad 
face of sorrow; it cools the fevered brow of suffering, 
and lightens even the gloom that gathers around a grave. 
Love throbs in the noble impulses of friendship, it blushes 
upon the cheek of girlhood; it brings delight to man and 
maid as they whisper their precious secret beneath the 
stars; it shines with heavenly beauty in a mother's eyes; 
it prattles through baby lips as rosy fingers press at ivory 
breasts; and whether in a mud hut or a marble palace, 
love is what makes a home. 

Love touches the poet's tongue with fire; it sounds 
upon music's vibrant string, and it spreads the artist's 
canvas with the masterpieces of genius. Love paints the 
sunset and perfumes the rose, and spreads beauty and 
bloom around the world. Love moves the tiniest atom 
of matter within the molecule, it holds the earth true 
to its orbit, as it wheels around the sun; it directs the 
course and destiny of every flaming star and rushing 
planet; and it reaches up to its highest heights in Jesus 
Christ upon the cross, for *'God is Love !" 



WHO IS GOD? 137 

*'Love divine, all love excelling, 
Joy of heaven to earth come down, 
Fix in us Thy humble dwelling, 
All thy faithful mercies crown! 

Jesus, Thou art all compassion, 
Pure, unbounded love Thou art; 
Visit us with Thy salvation; 
Enter every trembling heart." 



CHAPTER XI 

BUILDING THE TEMPLE; OR GOD'S CALL TO 
HIS CHURCH TO-DAY 

Scripture Lesson: Haggai 2:1-9. "In the seventh month, in the 
one and twentieth day of the month, came the word of the Lord by 
the prophet Haggai, saying. Speak now to Zerubbabel, the son of 
Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and to Joshua, the son of Josedecb, 
the high priest, and to the residue of the people, saying, Who is 
left among you that saw this house in her first glory? And how do 
ye see it now? Is it not in your eyes in comparison of it as nothing? 
Yet now be strong, O Zerubbabel, saith the Lord; and be strong, O 
Joshua, son of Josedech, the high priest ; and be strong, all ye 
people of the land, saith 'the Lord, and work: for I am w4th you, 
saith the Lord of hosts : According to the word that I covenanted 
with you when we came out of Egypt, so my spirit remaineth among 
you : fear ye not. For thus saith the Lord of hosts : Yet once, it is 
a little while, and I will shake the heavens, and the earth, and the 
sea, and the dry land ; and I will shake all nations, and the desire of 
all nations shall come ; and I will fill this house with glory, saith the 
Lord of hosts. The silver is mine, and the gold is mine, saith the 
Lord of hosts. The glory of this latter house shall be greater than 
of the former, saith the Lord of hosts : and in this place will I give 
peace, saith the Lord of hosts." 

Text: "Be strong, all ye people of the land, . . . and work; 
. . . for I am with you: and I will fill this house with glory, 
saith the Lord of hosts.""' (Haggai 2:4-7,) 

This text in itself is a sermon. May God speak to us 
through it! All that I hope to do is to enlarge and 
illustrate the text, to hold it before our minds and turn 
it about from one side to the other that it may become 
indeed God's message to our waiting souls. 

See how comprehensive this summons from God is : 
**Be strong, all ye people of the land, . . . and work; . . . 
for I am with you : and I will fill this house w^ith glory, 
saith the Lord of hosts.'' 

138 



GOD'S CALL TO HIS CHURCH 139 

Glance for a moment at the historical setting of this 
text. These words were spoken about seventy years after 
Solomon's temple was destroyed; for that w^as in the 
nineteenth year of the captivity of the Jews, while this 
prophecy came about the nineteenth year after the cap- 
tivity. Cyrus the Great, actuated perhaps by the strik- 
ing prophecies concerning himself in Isaiah (Is. 
44:28-45), had granted the Jews liberty, allowed many 
to return to Jerusalem, and had furnished them w^th 
the necessities for restoring the temple (11 Chr. 36:23; 
Ezra 1:1-22 J. But the work, though well begun, had 
been delayed because of the opposition of the Samari- 
tans, who were angered for the reason that they were 
refused a part in the enterprise, and because of an inter- 
dict by Smerdis, the usurper. But when Darius came to 
the throne (521 B. C), he set aside this interdict and 
was favorable to the work. Using the former opposition 
as a convenient excuse, however, many of the Jews who 
had returned to Jerusalem were indifferent to the great 
project of rebuilding the temple, and instead were em- 
ploying their means and opportunities to build magnifi- 
cent mansions for themselves. Haggai and Zechariah 
were sent of the Lord to stir them up to the w^ork, and 
the ringing words of the text w^ere spoken by Haggai 
in the discharge of this high duty. 

There were some among the old men present who 
had seen the former glory of the temple of Solomon, 
and who were inclined to be sorrowful and discouraged 
because of the less pretentious nature of the new^ build- 
ing already begun. But with fine hope and optimism, 
Haggai encouraged these faint hearts by pointing to a 
new glory that should come to the house. The former 
glory of Solomon's temple, arising from gold and silver 
and from the presence of the ark, the Urim and Thumim, 
and the splendor of the fitry cloud of the shechinah, 



140 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

which symboHzed the presence of Jehovah, had passed 
away no more to return ; but the prophet tells them here 
that in this later house should come a new glory — even 
the divine Messiah to be shrouded in flesh instead of a 
shining cloud. He vvas to be ''the Desire of all nations/' 
and the spiritual power and glory of God were to fill this 
house through His presence and miracles. 

These w^ords were partially fulfilled vrhen the Savior 
came to the temple, which Herod had completed; but the 
prom.ised glory is to be ultimately revealed in the second 
coming of Christ, as this prophecy in its ulterior refer- 
ence seems to foretell. So in ]\Ialachi 3 :i we read : 'The 
Lord whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, 
even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight 
in: behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts.'' And 
we are told in Ephesians (2:20-22) that we as believers 
are "built upon the foundation of the apostles and 
prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner- 
stone. In whom all the building, fitly framed together, 
groweth into an holy temple in the Lord." 

Thus, while the old temples, with their material sym- 
bols, have vanished away, the building of the new temple, 
the spiritual temple, the church of the living Christ, in 
which He is head and all of us are parts "fitly framed 
together," is to continue until our Lord shall come again 
to fill it with His glory, and to take it to himself. And 
it is ours to carry on this blessed work until he comes. 

THE church's two-fold OBJECTIVE 

Notice first, then, the work. God's work is the same 
in every age. Though the methods and immediate appli- 
cations may vary, there is essential unity in its aims and 
objects, whether it be the temple work of Jerusalem in 
the long ago or the work of the church to-day. This 



GOD'S CALL TO HIS CHURCH 141 

work of God's people takes two general directions. It 
has two great objectives — the material or temporal objec- 
tive and the spiritual or eternal objective. It is well for 
us to keep these clearly in miind. 

Let us look brieiiy at the material or temporal objec- 
tive. There was a practical work to be performed. 
These Jewish exiles who had returned to Jerusalem were 
God's people and representatives, and they were engaged 
in practical tasks of comm.unity betterm.ent. Xot only 
did the temple need to be reerected, but the walls of 
Jerusalem had to be rebuilt, good order had to be brought- 
out of social chaos, and the reign of righteousness had to 
supplant pagan iniquities. 

So to-day the church has a great practical duty and- 
mission. There are institutions that must be builded. 
There are educational and philanthropic agencies that 
must be supported. There are immemorial social wrongs 
to be overcome. There are hoar}' and entrenched in- 
iquities to be destroyed. 2vIammon and materialism erect 
their thrones and build their altars in our modern civiliza- 
tion just as they did in that pagan world. Intemperance 
weakens and destroys the race. Commercialized vice 
flaunts its hideous form brazenly before the ver\' eyes of 
our modern cities; poHtical corruption challenges our 
citizenship; and the exploitation of the weak and poor 
cries with a thousand voices for redress. 

The true church of God cannot shut her eyes or close 
her ears to these wrong conditions. The church is not 
a hospital to nurse sick saints into heaven. It is rather 
an armory to train ''good soldiers of Jesus Christ/' and 
prepare them to battle for the redemption of a lost world, 
and then to inherit heaven. Thank God that down the 
ages the church has understood this; and as best she 
could with the means at hand, has striven valiantly 
and successfully against ever}' form of social wrong. 



142 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Despite all criticism or misunderstanding of the church 
in our age this is true. There is an easy-going idea 
abroad in the land that we have about outgrown the 
church, and will soon not need it any more. This is 
a foolish fallacy. Organization and system are vital to 
everything that is worth while in the world. 

The courts must have their place of meeting and form 
of procedure; the school must have its established sys- 
tem and curriculum. The country must have its flag and 
customs and rallying cries. The army must have its 
rules and organization and drills. The idea, then, that 
religion will live (and its good work survive) as a vague, 
unorganized aspiration, floating around in thin air with- 
out body or form, is the most idiotic delusion with which 
the devil has misled an easily gullible age. No, if the 
strength and the inspiration of God's church were taken 
from behind the charitable and reform agencies of to- 
day, they would not survive for a single generation, but 
society would soon lapse back into the selfishness, sen- 
suality and decay, which characterized the Roman world 
at the time when the Babe of Bethlehem lay in his manger 
cradle beneath the Judean stars. What good achieve- 
ment, even of this modern world of ours, do we see which 
has not had its fountain-head in the religion of the lowly 
Nazarene? Apart from its efforts or influences, direct 
or indirect, what practical work of utility or benevolence 
can you point to to-day? What is it that gives direction 
to the best of human laws but the inspiration of the 
divine laws? What is it that shapes and models our ad- 
vancing social forms but the heavenly ideals which are 
leading the children of men toward an eternal city — "a 
new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteous- 
ness"? What is it that builds schools, asylums and hos- 
pitals, and inspires the Red Cross and the Y. M. C. A. 
following our armies to-day, but the beneficent impulses 



GOD'S CALL TO HIS CHURCH 143 

born of the religion of the Christ who told us of the 
"Good Samaritan"? Where are the Voltaire hospitals 
for the maimed? Where are the Tom Paine schools for 
the ignorant? Where are the IngersoU asylums for the 
fatherless and the poor? Oh, yes, Christianity is a 
vitally practical thing, and there are great and blessed 
tasks of human service to which we will here set our 
hands together. Yet, in all of this, we need to remember 
that this social service activity is not an end in itself, but 
only a means to a higher end. 

For the greatest objective at last of all Christian work 
is a spiritual and eternal objective. In Haggai's day the 
temple was to point to God and the hereafter. So to-day, 
through the redeeming power of Jesus Christ in His 
church, men are to be prepared for eternity. This rounds 
out the circle of Christian aims and efforts, and enables 
Christianity to embrace the two worlds — earth and 
heaven. Men are to be taught the true duties and rela- 
tionships of this life and how to enjoy life in every high 
and noble way; but more than that, they are to be in- 
structed so to live here that they may live in harmony 
and peace with God hereafter. They are to be saved 
with ''an everlasting salvation." We are to recognize 
in all our efforts, then, that this life is not all — that, in- 
deed, its interests are but a small and secondary part of 
our real Hfe. The Hfe in time is to our true life as is 
the atom to the mountain or the bubble to the sea. The 
tendency, therefore, of some modern churches to put 
overemphasis upon the life here and now is a fatal and 
destructive blunder. The trouble is that such efforts are 
founded largely upon materialistic conceptions of life, 
and are inspired by a philosophy and theology which 
should bear the well-knoAvn label, ''Made in Germany." 

The alleged mistake of the early church in over- 
emphasizing "other-worldliness" may have been a great 



144 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

mistake, and may have led to unfortunate consequences; 
but the other extreme to which many go in this age of 
cukivating too much present-worldhness is far more 
fatal and disastrous. *'If in this Hfe we have hope we 
are of all men most miserable'' (i Cor. 15:19). There 
is nothing left to us except a cheap and utilitarian 
philosophy of life. ''Let us eat, drink and be merry, for 
to-morrow we die.'' Our preaching is vain and your 
faith is also vain unless the human soul is immortal and 
the human life has before it the deep perspective of 
eternity. It is this glorious truth alone which gives any 
real meaning to life; which makes virtue and honor and 
truth worth while; which lifts man from the degradation, 
insignificance and m.ud into which modern materialism 
would plunge him, and enables him to be seen in his true 
character as a child of God, crowned with a spiritual 
beauty and light that are eternal! 

Let us understand, therefore, that the true aim of 
social service is to open the way for spiritual service. 
Mere reform apart from Christ cannot permanently heal 
the sores of our society. Jesus did not say '*Ye must 
be reformed again," but he did say ''Ye must be born 
again." We need the old-fashioned truth of regenera- 
tion as the basis of all our thinking. We may as 
well be done with idle dreaming of a man-made perfect 
society and ideal state. We cannot build a good society 
out of bad men any more than we could build a good 
house out of bad boards. To improve environment gives 
a better chance for the transforming truths of God to 
reach the hearts and change the lives of men, and that 
is the Christian's philosophy of social service. The 
church is not here to work reform, merely for the 
sake of reform. She is here to help reform society that 
thereby she may transform men. The Son of God did 
not come down from heaven to earth and die upon the 



GOD'S CALL TO HIS CHURCH 145 

cross merely to give ''down and outs'' a plate of soup and 
a cake of soap! The agony of Calvary was a proclama- 
tion of the value of man's immortal soul, and of the 
length to which a loving God would go to redeem it. Oh, 
friends, the message which this materialistic, war-w^asted 
and sin-sick age of present-worldliness needs is the 
blessed message that our real life is beyond; that the star 
which sets here has elsewhere is rising; that the cords 
of love which on earth are broken, will be reunited to 
vibrate in unending harmony; that purity and righteous- 
ness, though often suffering here, are to find their full 
reward; that justice is to triumph; and that in this world 
we are but strangers and pilgrims journeying on to a 
heavenly home! I do not want anything sw^eeter or 
bettter than that. These old Bible truths are good enough 
for me. They are good enough to live by; and, God 
knows, they are the only things good enough to die by! 

NO SLACKERS IN THE KINGDOM OF GOD 

Let us glance now at the workers mentioned in our 
text. Who are they? Why, ''all the people." God ex- 
pects every redeemed soul to be a redeemer of others. 
I realize somewhat the distractions and difficulties of 
church work in a great city like New York. But I also 
realize that unless God's people are all willing to make the 
sacrifices necessary, the work cannot go forward as it 
should. 

There are some duties so sacred that they cannot be 
delegated. A mother's love, for example, cannot be dele- 
gated. It must express itself in service. So of our work 
for Christ. We are all priests unto God. 

The soldier cannot delegate his duties. He must fight 
and, if need be, die for liberty and native land. We are 
called to be ''good soldiers of Jesus Christ." What a 



146 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

spectacle do we now behold yonder in Europe ! ''AH the 
people" giving of their best in the name of patriotism 
and for the love of country. Must we not, then, give of 
our best in the higher name of religion, and for the love 
of God? 

See them yonder, tender women giving up home and 
ease and comfort, and working like men at the forge and 
in the foundry, and on the farm. Little children doing 
not merely their ''bit" but doing their best, and giving 
their all. And men — men by the tens of millions — 
marching and enduring and struggling and striving, in 
mud and ice and rags and filth, and giving up the rich 
treasure of their blood on a thousand gory fields! 

What answer have we Christian soldiers to make to 
all of that? Dare we sit here in comfort, ease and 
luxury, hugging our blessings to ourselves, when there is 
a world of lost souls about us and when our soldiers in 
Europe are giving us such matchless examples of heroism 
and devotion? Unless we are to be forever shamed be- 
fore the ages must we not match the shining exploits 
of carnal warfare with the higher achievements of the 
spirit? 

There is no place in the religious world to-day for 
"slackers." A religious slacker is more despicable than a 
military slacker! If God dealt with His soldiers as 
sternly as our Government deals with hers, I am afraid 
there would be several million courts-martial in the Chris- 
tian camps! A soldier who is unfaithful is backed up 
against a wall and shot. What will God do, then, with 
His soldiers who are unfaithful? Surely every one of us 
can be faithful and do something for our blessed Master. 
Listen to a true story from the war: 

It was early morning. All along the trenches the ex- 
pectant thousands were waiting the command which 
would send them "over the top" and across "No Man's 



GOD'S CALL TO HIS CHURCH 147 

Land'' into the hell of shot and shell. With these British 
heroes were a detachment of engineers whose duty it 
was to go over with the fighters and give attention to the 
guns and, as the trenches were captured, turn the cap- 
tured guns against the fleeing enemy, and prepare against 
a counter-attack. 

At last the command rang forth, and like a mighty 
flood the Niagara of living determined men scrambled 
over the bullet-swept top. Some fell at once to rise no 
more; but for miles the mighty host swept over and on. 

Among the first to go over was one of these engineers, 
a Canadian. He had no gun. He did not have to lead. 
His place was in the rear. But up to the top of the para- 
pet he climbed and caught a flag from the hand of a 
falling soldier, and unfurled it amid the blinding sheet of 
flame. He stood with one hand holding the bullet-torn 
flag, and with the other he pointed across ''No Man's 
Land" to the Hun lines, and with a mighty voice above 
the tumult he cried out, ''On, Canadians, on! On, Cana- 
dians, on!" Moved by this heroism, those invincible 
Canadians went "over the top," swept across that fearful 
stretch of death, into the enemy's lines, and miles of 
trenches were captured. Briton's valor had maintained 
its glorious reputation, because a private — an engineer — 
with only a spade and a wrench, had cheered it. One 
man had been a hero and that had inspired ten thousand 
more. 

A DIVINE PARTNERSHIP 

And in all of this, notice that we have two great and 
precious promises from God. 

He is with us while we work. "Be strong, all ye people 
of the land, and work . . . for I am with you." Thank 
God that we do not have to labor alone. How precious 
is the assurance that God is v/ith us! He is not an 



148 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

absentee God looking down upon His creation from afar 
off. He is here working in and through us ''both to will 
and to do of His good pleasure/' 

This means that w^e must keep ever in touch and com- 
munion with the source of our power. A trolley car 
that has slipped its wire is useless. Our work needs to be 
saturated with prayer. Work without prayer is pre- 
sumption — and prayer without work is hypocrisy. Re- 
cently I saw some workmen painting the blank side of a 
very high house wall. The narrow, easily lowered scaf- 
fold was swung high. It was a dizzy, somewhat uncer- 
tain footing for the painters. But a strong cable secured 
on the roof of the house, swinging down by the side of 
each man, gave him just the sense of safety and support- 
ing steadiness which he needed while he worked. For by 
his left hand he held the rope, and with his free right 
hand he spread the paint with skill and energy. 

In every Christian labor, our two hands are thus em- 
ployed, grasping the cable of God's promises and the 
sure word of His support with one hand, while the other 
is filled with all that mxaterial and practical work which 
aids our fellowmen, and helps to perfect the kingdom 
in the world. The right hand of the painter worked 
freely, because firmness and fearlessness were asssured 
him by his strong clasp of the rope vdth his left. Prayer 
and promise in our left hand, work for others in the 
right, is our attitude as workers for God. 

The other blessed assurance of our text is that God 
will reward our faithful efforts. 'T will fill this house 
with glory, saith the Lord of hosts.'' There is no failure 
possible when we thus labor with God. Whether the re- 
sults come remotely or immediately, whether they are 
seen or unseen, we may know that the harvest will come 
from our faithful sowing because God has promised it 
and He will do it. The ''Desire of all nations" has come. 



GOD'S CALL TO HIS CHURCH 149 

The living spirit of the victorious Christ is with us 
''always, even unto the end of the age,'' and this noble 
house shall see His glory. This is our part of the spirit- 
ual temple. Here we are to prepare for the coming of 
the King. Here He 'Svill give peace" to troubled spirits. 

And as we work and as we pray, may we do all for 
the glor\' of Christ! ]\Iay the supreme object in every 
heart be to glorify Him who "loved us and gave him- 
self for us'' ! 

There is an inspiring and beautiful incident told of 
the coronation of Queen A^ictoria. The young Queen 
had been instructed to keep her seat, though every one 
else was to rise, while Handel's ''Messiah" was being ren- 
dered toward the close of the ceremony. Though the 
commons and the nobles and the clerg}' were to stand 
with uncovered heads, it was thought fitting that royalty 
should be distinguished by remaining seated upon the 
throne of power. But as the beautiful oratorio pro- 
ceeded, it is said that the young Queen was visibly 
affected. \A'hen the crowning chorus was reached, she 
trembled at the words. ''And He shall reign forever and 
ever." And when the next sublime line rolled up on the 
wings of melody, "Lord of Lords and King of Kings," 
the young Queen could stand it no longer but rose weep- 
ing to her feet, and removed the crown from her head 
in the presence of Him who is supreme over all. 

And I would that high over every other motive, aim 
and aspiration we shall all strive to honor Christ su- 
premely; to love Him sincerely; to serve Him humbly; 
and to make Him in our hearts and homes and lives 
"Lord of lords and King of kings!" 



CHAPTER XII 

THE TRANSFORMING POWER OF THE 
CHRIST 

Text: "We all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the 
glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image, from glory 
to glory, even as from the Lord the Spirit." (ii Cor. 3:18.) 

The ^'Twentieth Century New Testament'' gives a 
free translation of the Greek in this passage, as follows : 
''All of us, with faces from which the veil is lifted, see- 
ing, as if reflected in a mirror, the glory of the Lord, are 
being transformed into his likeness, from glory to glory, 
as it is given by the Lord, the Spirit." 

In these early chapters of the Second Epistle to the 
Corinthians, the Apostle Paul, through speaking of his 
own God-directed achievements among them, is led into 
a comparison between the old covenant and the new. 
This was made necessary by the opposition to him on the 
part of worldly members of the church, and by the slow- 
ness of the Jews in their midst to receive the truth of 
Christ. Paul makes clear that the religion of Jesus 
Christ is not one of legalism and dead forms, but of 
liberty and spirit. He does not, indeed, intimate that 
the religion of the old dispensation was entirely devoid of 
spiritual content but he does say that it was only a 
preparation for something better. The stars shine 
brightly in the sky until the moon rises, but she then 
swallows up their lesser light. The moon is mistress of 
the heavens until the full-orbed glory of the sun comes 

150 



TRANSFORMING POWER OF CHRIST 151 

over the eastern hills, and then the light both of moon 
and stars is lost in his greater radiance. Their effulgence 
is not destroyed: it is absorbed and advanced into the 
sun's brighter rays. Thus, to Paul, all the glories of the 
old dispensation have paled before the greater splendor, 
which shines from the Christ. 

But he declares that this glory is not apparent to all; 
and here he makes a reference to the incident, narrated 
in the thirty-fourth chapter of Exodus, where Moses 
veiled his face when he came down from talking w^ith 
God on the Mount, because his flesh shone with super- 
natural brightness. Paul makes in this reference no re- 
flection on I\Ioses' character, as some have thought. 
There is here intended no intimation that the Hebrew 
Lawgiver employed deceit. Paul merely saw in Moses' 
use of the veil a convenient figure for the truth that the 
Jews did not see that the old covenant was transitory, 
and that its glory was to be lost in that of the new. 
So when the gospel of Christ was preached to them they 
could not see it clearly, because of the veil of prejudice 
and worldliness before their eyes. 

VEILED AND UNVEILED EYES 

And how true is that of many to-day! The glory of 
the Christ is filling the whole world, but many are not 
seeing it because of clouded visions. While I was a stu- 
dent at ]\Iercer University, in Macon, Georgia, our as- 
tronomy class gathered one night to study the stars. We 
got everything in readiness, and one of the students was 
selected to make the observations. We all stood expec- 
tant, with note books in hand, ready for his report; but 
he looked through the instrument and declared that he 
could see nothing. We knew that the telescope was 
pointed in the right direction; but he looked again, and 



152 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

declared that all was as blank and black as midnight. 
We then made an examination, and found that the thin 
inside cap, which protected the costly lens, had not been 
removed when the main cap was taken off. And so 
the young man could not see. All the glory of the sum- 
mer heavens was there : the moon, like a beautiful shep- 
herdess, leading forth her flock of stars; the deep color- 
ing of the sky, — all the majesty and mysterv' of a perfect 
night were before him, but not for his eyes ! 

How many there are to-day — multitudes, alas ! within 
our churches, whose faces have been blinded by preju- 
dice and ''the god of this world," until they cannot see 
the beauty and glory of the Christ! None of the fault 
is with him. He is ever here, with all his loveliness and 
charm, yet many never see Him ! 

Yes, the fault is all our own. Thank God, he gives 
to every man the possibility of an unveiled face! 'The 
natural man receiveth not the things of the spirit of God. 
Neither indeed can he, for they are spiritually discerned," 
but God has given unto us freely of his Spirit, and 
'Svhere the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty." We 
are free to turn to Christ with that look of humility 
and faith, inspired by the Holy Spirit, which clears our 
visions and saves our souls. When we thus become 
''willing to do the will of God," we begin to "know of 
the doctrine," to see the beauty of the Christ, and to 
enter into "the glorious liberty wherewith Christ doth 
make us free." 

THE MARVELOUS MIRROR 

But where, our hearts naturally ask, are we to look 
for this saving vision? The text answers, "Beholding, as 
in a mirror, the glory of the Lord." We can no longer 
see the Christ face to face, as did the Apostles and early 



TRANSFORMING POWER OF CHRIST 153 

Christians. We see him now as one reflected to us in a 
mirror. 

What is that mirror? \\^hat can it be for us other 
than our gospel record as found in the New Testament? 
While the covenant existed and the early Christians lived 
under it, before the record was made, the record is never- 
theless, at this distance of time, our first means of know- 
ing the person and work of Jesus Christ; and it is his 
personality and not a code of laws, which is the heart 
and center of Christianity. We are not, to be sure, slaves 
to the ''letter," for our blessings are all ''by the Spirit" ; 
yet the Word is all important, for it shrines the Christ, 
and through the Word the Spirit w^orks. "The word is 
the sword of the Spirit," and if the word is mutilated or 
lost the Spirit stands disarmed! 

In the city of Washington, there is a unique and re- 
markable copy of the constitution of the United States. 
If one examines it closely, it appears simply a chaos of 
irregular lines and peculiar lettering. But when the visi- 
tor steps back and views it in proper perspective, he is 
suddenly surprised to see the face of George Washington 
looking out upon him. The lines are so spaced and the 
letters are so shaded as to miake a good likeness of the 
Father of our Country. And just as Washington's face 
shines through all our early history, as crystallized and 
reflected in the constitution, so does the glorious face 
of Christ look out upon us from the pages of our Bible. 

But we need the right viewpoint and the leadership 
of God's spirit before we can see it at all. The supreme 
need in the religious world of to-day is a right concep- 
tion of the nature and province of the Holy Bible. Many 
are looking at it in the wrong way, and consequently 
are losing its true message, and the vision of the Christ 
which it contains. The Bible is an impressionist picture. 
It is painted in the broad, and consequently it needs a 



154 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

proper viewpoint, and a right perspective, if we are really 
to see its beauties. View it microscopically, and, as 
with any other impressionist picture, the entire effect is 
lost. We will see then only the weave of the canvas 
and the great ugly lumps of paint. 

The Bible is not an iron safe, which can be opened 
only by some key which we are strong enough to forge 
and fashion or some combination which we are skillful 
enough to figure out. The Bible is rather a beautiful 
flower, which cannot be forced open, but which opens 
of itself in the w^arm sunlight of faith and love. And we 
need above all things else to-day that humility of soul, 
and that warmth of appreciative atmosphere, which will 
cause it once more to open its lovely heart, and give 
to our generation that fragrance and beauty which so 
enriched the generations that are gone. 

Or, to change the figure once again, the Bible is a 
spiritual telescope. The purpose of a telescope is to en- 
able us to see the stars. The man who takes the telescope 
to analyze its brass, that he may determine its constitu- 
ent parts, or the man who spends his time in curious 
speculations concerning the half-effaced name of its 
maker, misses entirely the true meaning and mission of 
the telescope. 

There is a legitimate place for devout scholarship and 
reverent Biblical criticism; but much that parades itself 
as scholarship to-day is self-deluded doubt; and the vain 
speculations of many critics have caused them and others 
to lose the glorious vision of the real Christ which the 
Bible contains. 

WHAT IS THE REAL GLORY OF CHRIST? 

But what does Paul mean when he uses here this 
strange term, ''the glory of the Lord"? Does he not evi- 



TRANSFORMING POWER OF CHRIST 155 

dently mean all that belongs to the Lord, both of char- 
acter and achievement, and neither to the exclusion of the 
other? Upon one side the glory of Christ is the glory of 
a perfect character. The moral loveliness of Jesus is the 
wonder of our world. Before it, even such skeptics as 
Mills, Rousseau and Renan are moved to bow down in 
admiration if not in worship. It is the glory of earth's 
sublimest soul ! In that character, honesty was incarnate, 
purity reached its perfect flower, and love reigned with- 
out alloy. Who can look upon it and not feel the influ- 
ence of its mystic charm attracting the soul? 

But beautiful as that character is, we cannot stop here, 
if we are to see the full-rounded glory of the Lord. We 
must look, too, at the glory of his achievement. The 
principal subject of Paul's gospel was not Jesus, the car- 
penter of Nazareth, or the Preacher of the Sermon on the 
Mount, but Christ, the Lord of Glory, as he was ever 
calling him. Paul's conception of Christ is always domi- 
nated by the vision of him which he caught on the 
Damascus road. He saw Him there not merely as an 
example but as an object of devout and humble worship; 
and it was that vision which transformed Paul. Any 
teaching which interprets Paul's writings otherwise 
grossly misrepresents him. 

We are hearing in some quarters to-day the cry, "Back 
to Jesus.'' But let us remember that we can never get 
back to the real Jesus, save by the road that leads over 
the dark mquntain of Calvary; and down into the bright 
valley of the empty tomb! We are not regenerated and 
transformed by accepting Jesus as a model, and giving our 
imaginations play upon the elements of His character. It 
is important to do this ; but the first requisite, the thing, 
indeed, which makes it possible for us really to accept 
Christ as a model, in the right way, is the look of grati- 
tude and faith toward Him as our Redeemer and King. 



156 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

The best transforming influences of life are not in- 
tellectual, but moral and vital. Many see the truth who 
never follow it. It is not the glance of memory and 
imagination backward to a dead Jesus, but the look of 
adoration and aspiration forward and upward to a cruci- 
fied, risen, reigning, and coming Lord, that lifts us out 
of our old selves and leads us up into higher walks 
of being. As the foundation of our religion, we need 
not only a subject for intellectual contemplation and 
assent, but an object of worship and reverent love. 
Isaiah saw in his vision the *Tord upon his throne," 
''high and lifted up," and it was that vision which smote 
him with a sense of his own unworthiness and led to the 
deeper consecration which caused him to exclaim, 'Tord, 
here am I, send me !" 

The present day overemphasis upon * 'social service" 
as a substitute for personal salvation flows from this mis- 
take of not seeing the true and full rounded glory of 
Christ. Oh, that we might be rid forever of the poor, 
mistaken, limited human "Jesus" of the new theology — a 
mere example and guide, "the greatest of the prophets" 
— so that we once more can see in the full beauty of His 
achievements, as well as His character, the Lord of 
Glory ! 

When I was a boy my two brothers and I planned to 
play a joke on Aunt Milly, our old negro "mammy." We 
found an immense pumpkin and hollowed out the inside. 
We cut in it two holes for eyes, a long, rakish nose, and 
a hideous, snaggle-toothed mouth. Then about nine 
o'clock at night we lit a candle and put it inside the pump- 
kin, went out to Aunt Milly's little house in the back yard, 
set the pumpkin on a post just behind her window, and 
draped a sheet, ghost-like, around the post. We then 
slipped up to the window, intending to tap and watch her 
amazement and fright as she threw open the blind and 



TRANSFORMING POWER OF CHRIST 157 

found herself face to face with the apparition. But just 
as we were about to knock, we heard a voice inside the 
room, and looking in through the crack under the wooden 
shutter, we saw old Aunt Milly, down on her knees, be- 
side her bed, saying her prayers before she retired for 
the night. x\nd it happened that just as we got there 
she was praying for us three boys. There she knelt, 
with her old black face bright with the light of another 
world, as she carried our names to the throne of the 
Heavenly Father in prayer. Did we knock at the win- 
dow? Ah, no, we did not! If you had been there you 
would have seen three bad boys, hushed and subdued, 
steal noiselessly away from the window, slap a pumpkin 
off a post, gather up the sheet, and a little later go to 
sleep crying, after they had said their own prayers for 
the night. 

The picture of faith and devotion which I saw in 
that little room will ever linger in memory; and its 
influences have done much to make better my life. What 
was it that overcame our mischievous intention toward 
the old negro, and made us nobler boys ? Was it merely 
the thought of what Aunt Milly was? Ah, no! We 
knew that she was only an ignorant, humble old black 
woman. But the mem.ory of what Aunt Milly had done 
touched and transformed me. We remembered how lov- 
ingly she had cared for us during the helpless years of 
babyhood and childhood. We remembered how when 
there was trouble between any one of us and father in 
the front part of the house, our harbor of refuge was 
the kitchen and our place of consolation — Aunt Milly's 
lap. It made no difference what we had done, we always 
found love there and shelter in her sympathetic arms. 
We remembered, too, when mother was sick how Aunt 
Milly had watched over her by day and night. No hand 
except ''Milly's hand,'' as she expressed it, ''to tend Miss 



158 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Julie/' She was not only constantly at her bedside during 
the day, but like a faithful watch dog, she slept on the 
floor beside her bed during the long watches of the night. 
And the slightest sigh, the faintest whisper was enough 
to bring her instantly to the sufferer's side. And thus 
she nursed and loved her back to life and health. Ah, 
yes, we remembered all of this, and it was what Aunt 
Milly had done more than what she was that constituted 
her glory. And as we look upon Jesus, it is the power 
of what He did, even more than the beauty of His char- 
acter that constitutes His Glory. 

A TRANSFORMING POWER 

When we do see Him thus the vision exercises a mar- 
velous influence upon our lives. 'We all, with unveiled 
face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are 
transformed into the same image, from glory to glory." 
Who can contemplate the moral excellence of Jesus and 
the import of His unselfish life and sacrificial death with- 
out feeling the impulse of desire to accept Him as Lord, 
and to be like Him in character and service? 

At Curzo, Peru, there was formerly a famous temple 
dedicated to the worship of the sun. The temple was 
remarkable in that it had only three walls and no roof. 
It was open toward the east. There was a wall on the 
north, one on the south, another on the west, and the 
western wall was covered on the inside with burnished 
gold. It was the custom of the worshipers to gather in 
the early morning and kneel devoutly in the temple, wait- 
ing for the dawning of the day. At last the sun would 
rise in splendor over the mountains, lifting the miasmic 
mists, driving back the hazy darkness, and spreading 
across the valley, until his radiant light fell upon the 
burnished gold of the temple wall; and from there, as 



TRANSFORMING POWER OF CHRIST 159 

the worshipers knelt in hushed and devout reverence, the 
bright beams would be reflected onto their faces until 
they were all transformed. As we kneel before the 
Christ, some way, by the subtle workings of God's Holy 
Spirit, the vision which we catch transforms us into 
something of the same image. It is illustrated exactly 
in Hawthorne's story of *The Great Stone Face." It 
was not the thought of being like the face, or of fulfill- 
ing the prophecy, which changed the young man. It Vv^as 
the look of uncaiculating faith, adoration and love which 
he was ever giving toward the noble face in stone upon 
the mountainside, which transformed his features ^ until 
at last they were like those of the object of his faith 
and love. 

So looking unto Christ in faith and love, we are regen- 
erated and transformed. We feel His gracious power as 
we see Him emptying Himself of heavenly glory to take 
upon Him the form of a servant and to come to our sin- 
cursed world. We feel it when we behold His unselfish 
and beautiful life, as He walked the earth full of grace 
and truth. We feel it, above all, as we stand before the 
cross and see Him in the fullness of devotion, ''wounded 
for our transgressions and bruised for our iniquities." 
Yes, and we feel it, too, as we see the radiance which 
streams from His empty tomb, as we watch His ascension 
into glory, as we remember that even now ''he ever liveth 
to make intercession for us," and as we entertain that 
"blessed hope" that He will surely come back again! 

A PROGRESSIVE POWER 

Notice, too, that our text brings to us the great truth 
that this transforming influence of the Christ is a pro- 
gressive influence. It is "from glory to glory." "We 
all, with unveiled face, beholding, as in a mirror, the 



i6o THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image 
from glory to glory." 

At Columbia University, a short time ago, there was a 
most interesting lecture on stellar photography. In clos- 
ing his address the lecturer told his audience that he 
would throw upon the canvas a picture made from a nega- 
tive exposed for four minutes to a section of the heavens 
containing a nebula and its group of surroundings stars. 
As the picture fell upon the canvas it was only a blur. 
Then the lecturer showed a picture resulting from four 
hours of exposure, and it was a little brighter, yet blurred 
still. Next he showed a picture taken from a negative 
which had been exposed for sixteen hours — and it was 
beautiful. Then he said: ''Now, ladies and gentlemen, 
I will show you a scene which the human eye, aided 
even by the most powerful telescope, could never see ex- 
cept by stellar photography. I am to show you a picture 
made from a negative which was exposed for twenty- 
four hours. Six hours a night for four successive nights, 
the perfect machinery held the telescope with the negative 
beneath it focused on this part of the sky." And as the 
picture flashed upon the canvas, the great audience broke 
into applause. There before them was a section of the 
midnight heavens; the deep, rich blue of the sky, the stars 
shining in radiant beauty, and the nebula, like a dash 
of gold dust, gleaming through the center of it all! 

*Trom glory to glory," from character to character, 
we go, as we look upon the glory of our Lord! It is 
not the passing, curious, intellectual glance which gives 
the blessing. We must *'abide" in His presence ; and the 
longer our souls are expanded before Him, the nearer 
like Him do we become. 

Thus it is that our religion sets before us the inspira- 
tion of an endless perspective — Christ as an infinite ideal. 

It is an established principle of mathematics that by 



TRANSFORMING POWER OF CHRIST i6i 

dividing the remaining distance by half one can approach 
forever nearer to a given point, yet never completely 
reach it. Christ is the eternal and infinite spiritual goal 
toward which the believer is ever journeying, but which 
he will never altogether attain. If the foolish thought 
of perfect earthly sanctification were a truth, it w^ould 
take away one of our religion's greatest glories. 

Thank God for His assurance that on earth, and even 
in heaven itself, there will continue an endless process 
of progressive sanctification! Heaven is not a place of 
static finalities. If it were eternity would pall upon our 
souls. Even in heaven there will ahvays be something 
more to learn and do. There will be ever the possibility 
of further growth, expansion and development. As we 
go on in our apprehension of, and devotion to, the in- 
finite, eternal and ever-living Christ, we shall have more 
and more of His divine wisdom, power and love as the 
ages of eternity roll! And still there will be left further 
reaches of achievement to tempt our eager and aspiring 
souls ! 

Thus it is, too, that our religion honors humanity. 
The goal of Mohammedanism is to reach a sensuous para- 
dise, and to enjoy the embraces of black-eyed houris. 
The goal of the Buddhist is to attain Nirvana, and to 
lose his personality in the infinite ocean of being. The 
goal of the modern materialist is to fall back into the 
mud and mire from which he thinks he sprang. There 
is nothing before him except the night of oblivion, unlit 
by the radiance of a single star! But before the Chris- 
tian there is the promise of everlasting life, of a heavenly 
home, and of endless development and growth. 

It is this blessed truth which is to bring us. In our 
individual lives, up to the measure of holy manhood 
and womanhood ''in Christ Jesus." And it is this truth, 
too, which alone can be a sufficient inspiration to ade- 



1 62 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

quate service in the kingdom of our Lord. When we 
catch the sacred sweep of this truth of our text, then, 
indeed, will we be ready to forego the idle pleasures 
of this world, and count them but refuse, that we may 
win Christ, entering into the power of his resurrection 
and the fellowship of his suffering, and battling loyally 
on until from the eyes of our fellowmen the veils are 
lifted and the light has broken everywhere; until, indeed 
and in truth, ''the kingdoms of this world are become the 
kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ, and he shall 
reign forever and ever.'' 



CHAPTER XIII 
THE WORLD'S CRY AND CHRIST'S COMMAND 

Text: "Come over into Macedonia and help us." (Acts 16:9.) 

"Go ye into all the world and preach the Gospel to every crea- 
ture." (Mark 16:15.) 

These texts introduce us to one of the most exalted 
thoughts that the mind of man can entertain. There 
is an impulse of the human heart about which philos- 
ophers have speculated and which they have called ''the 
emotion of sublimity.'' This experience is not restricted 
to any one class of mankind. It comes to the poet, 
as his heart swells with inspiration before the majesty 
of snow-capped mountains or the splendor of the summer 
sea. It comes to the humble farmer boy, as all alone he 
watches the silent, but sublime, breaking of the day, or 
looks upon the tumult and fury of the passing storm. 
It comes to the mystic as he gazes into the starry face 
of the night and hears through her silent halls the 
whispers of Divine glory. It comes to the sailor, keep- 
ing watch all alone upon his ship in the solitude and dark- 
ness, as suddenly there rushes upon his mind the con- 
sciousness of the unfathomable abyss beneath him, and 
the wide waste of waters about him, and the limitless 
reaches of space above him. Rude and uncultured though 
he may be, his heart swells with the impressions this 
vastness makes upon him, and his thoughts are linked 
with the Infinite and the Eternal; This experience comes 
also as we listen to the strains of music, or as we thrill 
beneath the eloquence of some great orator, or as our 

163 



1 64 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

hearts leap within us at the tales of heroism which come 
from the stirring annals of war. 

But I wish to ask you, in this hour, if there is any- 
thing so calculated to stir vv'ithin us this emotion of 
sublimity as the missionary enterprise? Here is a thought 
great enough and glorious enough to lift us above all 
that is paltry and little, and to inspire the very highest 
and noblest that is in us. The very vastness of this 
enterprise, which has for its aim nothing short of the 
capture and transformation of the whole world; the fact 
that the Son of God, Himself, has come down from 
heaven to earth and endured the agony and disgrace of 
the cross, that that end may be attained; the tremendous 
obstacles and difficulties to be overcome before it is 
accomplished; and yet the glorious hope that through 
these things we are finally to see the woe and sorrow 
and sin of the whole w^ide world give way, until righteous- 
ness, justice, purity and peace shall reign in a new heaven 
and a new earth — surely no heart can remain indiffer- 
ent, passive or cold in the presence of thoughts such 
as these ! The most sublime consideration which it is 
possible for the human mind to entertain is this thought 
of world-wide conquest, in the name of our mighty 
Master. 

So I invite you to a consideration of this lofty themxC. 
As we turn to it, it is evident that there are two great 
sides to the missionary obligation. First there are the 
needs of the field; and, secondly, there are the com- 
mands of Christ to satisfy those needs. The two words 
of our text epitomize these obligations — the word 
^'Come'^ and the word "Go." 

THE CRY FOR HELP 

The cn- of the man of ]\Iacedonia, as Paul saw him 
in his vision, could not fail to make a profound impres- 



WORLD'S CRY— CHRIST'S COMMAND 165 

sicn •.:;:::: :::r :i::s:le's n::::d. V,'e have i:: this ?:r::'~- 
cani i:\::J-z:\z a:: ih::5:r:.:: ::: :: :':e :::::::ei::.:e ^,:\i c:rz:z 
leadersh:^ :: :.:- y^-'-'/ S;:::: ::: :,h :he affairs aai a:::vi- 
ties ■: : :ar taiay caarca, ^ ar :::k c: Ac:s. :a a very 
real seasc, is :ar "^::;r' :: :ar "-'-'-y Spir::." Every- 
where lis avr-raac :_- a:e saaa^ ; y. e Spirit said unto 
us/' "The H :y S:aa: caac : em," "They were 

filled with the Sairia e:c ?aaf s a an wisdom tried 
to plan ver}' aaarraa :r a: :ar a: a a:a :ae 

Spirit finally 1: A a: ::a ::n:a ^aal :r r:, . :„:: back 
into Asia. A:: :ac Holy Spirit sent him this visian of the 
man of iNIa: a : cahaya h a: : c ae v r ia:: Zar: e. 
and tht:s :ae carrcars of ahrisnaa hfe v^re rara^d 
toward riir 'h'rfa Have yea e"cr :i::aa::: A :::e em- 
sequences to l:s ta-aay. if t::e Haiy S;aa: had a:: haas 
led ana ?: a h.d not thus f:i': a^a" Samrsmy vaal 
had Tarari Aaa toward the Z:.sa aar f::r::aarrs m 
Zaa-mr -.'vaAi aave been deniid :\\z iiaa: A :ae armri. 



:v;n 



debt t: 

Paai h 

1 . .- ^ ,- 



a hea:i:rn :ua:Ae, Aii:ated to sapersrinra aai Srnsums 
vorshia. ins:r:A of a church of Jesus Chrisa 

This crv A h:e man a: iNfacedonia, 'A:me :ver and 
heia us." is a a: excressirn of the voiceless and yet pa- 
thetic aaaeai 'eao:h c:mes to us ta-da'." fren: :::e dark 
hear: e/:he hemb.n v-rrid. 

First cf ah. i: is the cr^' of Ignorance and supersti- 
tion for knomledg-e aai iAht. Have you ever stepped 
to give t:a:uahAu! c:nsidera:a:n to the real condhiens 
of human hfe. kzkei a: as a vdiAe, up:n this planet? 



1 66 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Because of the blessings which we enjoy, it is difficult 
for us to reaHze the shadow of deep darkness in which 
the vast majority of the human race are sitting. There 
are one bilHon people in heathen lands to-day. After 
all these thousands of years, only a very small fraction 
of the human race has been really civilized, and the light 
of truth has followed the narrow channels of Christian 
growth. The development of knowledge has not been 
uniform over the earth. Christian nations have made 
marvelous progress in scientific truth, in the power to 
think, in the growth of literature and art, and in the 
betterment of economic, social and political relationships. 
But in the heathen lands, the same black ignorance and 
the same terrible superstitions still enslave them. As in 
the prophets' day, the people still ''perish for lack of 
vision.'' ''Ye shall know the truth," said Jesus, "and 
the truth shall make you free," but these people have not 
the light of truth, and so they are still in the slavery of 
ignorance. Surely, no more powerful appeal can possibly 
come to human hearts, influenced by the love of Christ, 
than to know that multitudes are crying for the light 
and "with no language but a cry." We see millions of 
the human race, our own brothers, groping amid their 
death shadows and holding up their pathetic hands to 
heaven waiting for the dawn; and it is our mission to 
bring them the light. We can give them our scientific 
truth, our knowledge, our laws of sanitation and of so- 
cial justice, and all of the unnumbered blessings with 
which a gracious God has so richly dowered our land. 

SUFFERING PLEADING FOR RELIEF 

Again, the cry that comes to the Christian world from 
the heathen nations is the cry of mortal suffering plead- 
ing for relief. Destitution and distress always go with 



WORLD^S CRY— CHRIST'S COMMAND 167 

the lack of knowledge. Suffering and sin are the twin 
sisters of superstition and ignorance. 

The London Observer recently described the condition 
of the 330,000,000 people of India. It pointed out the 
fact that they numbered nearly three times as many as 
all the rest of the inhabitants of the British Empire put 
together. Then the paper used the following words : 

''By comparison with European nations, the poverty 
of countless patient millions is incredible; pitiful are the 
crudity of the means of life, its shortness, underfeeding, 
disease. Over 90 per cent of the men and 99 per cent 
of the women are totally illiterate. The peasants are 
ignorant and uncomprehending, submissive and credulous 
in a way only faintly to be imagined by the average west- 
ern mind. The masses are helpless, and they do not 
yet begin to conceive what is meant by electorates and 
representation. The educated minority fit for political 
life in our sense do not number one in a hundred.'' 

Women ought to remember these facts when they are 
purchasing their next set of furs or their next beautiful 
jewel. They ought to remember that 99 per cent of 
their sisters in India are still groveling in the mire of 
ignorance and appalling sin. And we men, so proud of 
our freedom and democracy, ought to remember these 
90 men out of every hundred in India who are living in 
such deep degradation. 

Try to imagine for a moment what a condition such 
as that described by this editor means in suffering to 
the individual. Only the few in the upper castes of India 
have any chance at all to the higher and better things 
of human life. The teeming millions are bound by super- 
stition and ground down by suffering; and what is 
true of India is true also to a greater or less extent 
of the entire heathen world. If we could stand, like the 



1 68 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

angel of the Apocalypse, in some central sun and look 
down upon this poor sin-cursed piane: c: curs, what 
sights would there siarrie :ur straining eyes. Ycnier 
comes Africa, like a gigantic question ntark, and there 
we would see nakedness ani 5:uai:r and sitante — hunian 
beings still eating each : titer ana ii-.ung cut iittie itigher 
than the brute creaticn. Tit-n tvcuia uitr-i ceneatit cur 
vision the teeming tttiiiicns c: Inaia, "utith the editor 
describes in the cu:t,ati:n abc'e; and if we ccuid see 
it all as God sa •- it, ciuctiess ue '■ruia unaerstana tvhy 
His heart broke uith crntpassitn ani u ity He v;as vail- 
ing to give His ovrn Son as the v.'orld's Saviour. V\'e 
would see little girls there in India, nt:thers at the 
pitiful age of twelve years, and shri-:cicc, wasted hags 
at the age of twenty-hve. We tvtuia see titz av.u'ul vul- 
tures hovering over the death houses to g:rge th-ntselves 
with human flesh, and we wculd see nttthers still ttssing 
their babies to the alligattrs thrcugh their fanatical zeal. 
And then would come Japan, s 
of China, greater in nuntter th 
400,000,000 of human beings, 
part in bestial sensualit^a vith :: 
cast through the land. Then v. 
its 10,000,000 newly made gr 
of human sin in a single vv 
wrecked homes and its twice te 
And then we would see X 
worship, its pleasure seeking and its s-ld^h luxuri-s : and 
South America, where a virgin continent, ri:::zr far nat- 
urally than any upon the earth, has been prtstituted and 
degraded by the influence of a so-called Christian church! 
Ah, what emotions of horror and griet* r::u_^t transux 
the holy heart of God as he looks down upu all :: this I 
And what must be the appalling coldness ani ^elushness 
of our own hearts if we can contemplate tltis awful 



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WORLD'S CRY— CHRIST^S COMMAND 169 

woe, unmoved by pity and unstirred by any impulse or 
purpose to help! To live here in our ease and comfort, 
and to seek our own pleasures and the safety of our own 
families, when all God's creation is travailing in suffer- 
ing and sorrow, is surely to brand ourselves as the most 
careless and heartless people who have ever lived upon 
this planet. If we did not know there would be some 
excuse, but if we fail to do our duty now we sin against 
the light. We can send to these suft'ering millions not 
only the torch of knowledge, which will banish their 
ignorance and bring them out into the fullness of life, 
but Vv'e can also take to them those moral precepts and 
those principles of physical healing which will elevate 
their lives and ease the agony of their pain-racked bodies. 
Thank God, we are beginning at last dimly to understand 
that we are our brother's keeper, and that God expects 
us to give ourselves in service, even as He gave His 
Son in salvation! 

THE CRY FOR ETERNAL LIFE 

This leads to the further remark that this call of the 
heathen world to us to-day is the cry of spiritual death 
for eternal Hfe. It is not enough simply to ameliorate 
the condition of temporal Hfe for these needy millions. 
We can give them culture and civilization, and yet their 
souls may still be lost. It is scarcely worth while to 
erect a superstructure of education and knowledge in the 
heathen world unless we put beneath it all the solid 
foundations of a real spiritual life. Paul looked out 
from Mar's Hill upon all of the beauty of Athens around 
him, yet his heart was moved as he saw that the city was 
wholly given to idolatrv'\ We dislike in this age to face 
the sterner facts of life. We have had so much of 
brightness and blessing in our own country, and we have 



1 70 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

such a boundless optimism, that we rather resent being 
presented with the darker side ; and yet Vv'e need to 
face the great Bible truth that men without Christ are 
lost forever. There is "no other name given under 
heaven among men whereby we must be saved.*' Lament 
as we will, the fact nevertheless stands that a man caught 
in a burning building will be destroyed if he does not 
know the way out, or the man upon a sinking ship will 
go down into the inexorable waves if he has no boat 
in which to make his escape. ]\Iuch of power and of 
enthusiasm have been lost to the modern missionar}' 
movement because we have gotten ''wibbly-washy" in 
our thinking upon this point. 

But you say, ''What about the holy heathen? x\re 
they not saved?'' I ask you. my friend, to present me 
with a holy heathen, and then perhaps I will be in a 
better position to answer your question. You say, "'\Miat 
about Socrates and Plato?" A\'ell, they were high souls 
for their day, and God doubtless will judge them accord- 
ing to their light and not according to our light to-day; 
and yet, when that is said, we have also to say that 
much of the light in them was darkness. The Greek 
civilization rotted and vanished from the earth because, 
despite their artistic genius and their intellectual power, 
the nation was lacking in true spiritual vision and was 
deficient in moral stamina. Ah, yes, what about Plato? 
I turn here to his masterpiece, 'The Republic," in which 
he is picturing the ideal state for the future, but I find 
him advocating the destruction of unfit and unwelcome 
babies. That is what his people had been accustomed to 
do, even in the very heart of the greatness and glor}' of 
Greece. Babies that were not welcome were carried out 
to the wild mountain heights and left to be killed by 
beasts or devoured bv vultures. Ah, no, talk not of holy 



WORLD'S CRY— CHRIST'S COMMAND 171 

heathen in the hght of the appalling conditions in this 
lost world of ours ! 

And wliat, let me ask you, would be the character of 
that future state in which those principles which heathen- 
ism has developed and those practices which the whole 
history of the heathen world illustrates, were suffered to 
survive? Would not heaven itself be turned into hell if 
such things were permitted to enter? 

My friends, if men could be saved by reason or good 
precepts, or even by good character, then there was no 
need for Jesus Christ to come from heaven to earth and 
to die upon the cross. He died because sin is a universal 
reality and because the world is lying in wickedness and 
woe. He died, therefore, to save all, not merely America 
and Europe, but all the needy children of men. With- 
out Him all are lost. Bitter and painful though this truth 
is, we must stop weakly seeking to avoid it or to side- 
step its implications, and bestir ourselves to warn the 
heathen before he dies. And they are dying now^ at the 
rate of 40,000,000 a year. Every tick of the watch 
sounds the death knell of a heathen soul. They are go- 
ing out into eternity without God and without hope. 
Every breath that we draw, four of these poor creatures 
die in their sins. Is it nothing to us ? Is it not high time 
to bestir ourselves with something of the zeal and power 
of the early church, that so rapidly captured a lost world? 
Well did Cary exclaim, *'How can a man be a Christian 
and not act?" Yes, how can we claim to be Christians, 
and not act when this appalling need of a lost race sends 
its piercing cry for help to our hearts? They have no 
other way out. We are God's ambassadors to them. He 
"hath committed unto us the ministry of reconciliation.'' 
And listen here to the inexorable logic of foreign mis- 
sions : "For whosoever shall call upon tlie name of the 
Lord shall be saved," and there is absolutely no promise 



172 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

to those who do not call. ''How then shall they call on 
him in whom they have not believed? And how shall 
they believe in him of whom they have not heard? 
And how shall they hear without a preacher ? And how 
shall they preach, except they be sent?" There is not 
a single broken link in that chain. That logic is flaw- 
less and inescapable. It is impossible for you and me to 
answer it with any excuse. The only answer is to act, 
and if we do not act, then the Word plainly teaches us 
that the blood of the lost shall be required at our hands. 
Oh, that v/e may realize to-day what it means to be 
a lost soul, and what heathenism means to those who live 
under its shadows ! Never can I forget an incident, re- 
lated in my church at Baltimore by one of the mission- 
ary friends who was at home on furlough from China. 
He told us that during his work in China he received 
a hurry call from a neighboring village to come and see 
a dying w^oman. He walked the twenty-five miles to 
reach her bedside. Thank God that there is still among 
the foreign missionaries some of the spirit of heroism 
and unselfishness in service that the early church knew! 
What a rebuke to us in our self-pleasing and laziness 
to-day! And so this young man walked the twenty-five 
miles, and when he came to this poor w^oman, he found 
her in a mud hut, lying upon a pile of straw in the corner. 
She turned her languid eyes upon him and said, ''Oh, I 
am so glad that you came and can tell me once more 
about His beautiful palace," He then learned from her 
that when she was a child, a chance visitor in another 
village, she had heard a missionary tell the story of the 
life of Jesus Christ and of the mansions that He has gone 
to prepare for those who love Him. And so she said she 
had sent for him, that he might tell her once more of 
His beautiful palace. And there upon the dirt floor of 
the hovel, far in the wilds of China, the faithful ambassa- 



WORLD'S CRY— CHRIST'S COMMAND 173 

dor of the cross kneeled and told her of the infinite love 
of God and of the saving grace and power of Jesus 
Christ. And that night, with her thin fingers clinging 
to his hand, she passed over to the better land. Yes, that 
is what Christ means to the heathen world — from the 
mud hut of earth to ''His beautiful palace'' ! 

Christ's command 

Meeting, now, this appalling and appealing cry that 
sounds to us from the heart of the heathen world is the 
Master's command to ''Go." "Go ye into all the world 
and preach the gospel to every creature." 

We need to understand, first of all, that this is the 
imperative of Divine authority. The Duke of AVelling- 
ton once remarked to a young preacher, whom he had 
heard explaining away the obligation of sending mis- 
sionaries to the heathen world, "Young man, it is your 
business to obey orders." AA^ellington was a soldier and 
he knew what authority meant, and he administered a fit- 
ting rebuke to the young soldier of the cross. If we 
could not see or understand at all the wisdom of mis- 
sions, and if from all our efforts on the foreign field 
there had never been a single convert, we W'Ould still be 
under obligation to obey, because the Captain of our sal- 
vation has given us the command to go. 

We need to understand, too, that Christ's command 
to go is given to meet a great opportunity to-day. The 
w^orld, through rapid transit and well-nigh miraculous 
means of communication, has become almost literally 
one great community. A group of British statesmen sat 
in a room in Downing Street, London, waiting for an 
answer from Germany to the British ultimatum, just be- 
fore the outbreak of the terrible war. The ultimatum 
was to expire at midnight. These men knew that no 



174 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

answer would come, but they waited faithfully until 
eleven thirty, London time, which was midnight, Berlin 
time. When eleven thirty rolled around and no reply 
had come, they snapped their watches to, and one of them 
said to another, ''How long will it take us to get the 
command for war to India, Australia, Canada and the 
other British dependencies?'' The secretary addressed 
answered, ''Six minutes !'' And in six minutes of time 
the news that Great Britain was at war with Germany 
reached around the earth, and the next morning before 
daylight they had replies from every section of the Em- 
pire that all was in readiness ! What a marvelous age 
it is in which we live, and how wonderfully God can 
use the inventions of to-day for the extension of His 
great kingdom ! China is now nearer to Xew York than 
New Orleans was before the day of railroads and steam- 
ships; and the doors of opportunity are open wide every- 
where. We have no longer such obstacles of political 
and racial prejudice as the early missionaries had to meet. 
Instead of opposition and bitter hatred, calls are coming 
now from every heathen land for m.ore missionaries. 
Again and again have these messages been presented to 
our mission boards and societies, of how cities and prov- 
inces and entire heathen countries are clamoring for 
American teachers and medical missionaries and 
preachers. 

OUR BOUNDLESS WEALTH TO-DAY 

We must admit, too, that Christ's command is ad- 
dressed to-day to those who are amply able to obey. 
Some people answer the foreign mission appeal by say- 
ing, *'We ought to save our own country first." But 
home missions are never hurt, rather they are always 
helped by foreign missionary enthusiasm and fidelity. 



WORLD'S CRY— CHRIST'S COMMAND 175 

The light which shines farthest shines most brightly at 
home. We are putting the bulk of our efforts here in 
the homeland. It has been estimated that we spend 
about 98 cents out of every dollar given for church work 
and missions here at home, and that we send, therefore, 
only about tw^o cents out of each dollar for foreign mis- 
sions. Surely no one w^ould say that we dare do less 
than this. Indeed, my dear friends, ought we not to do 
a great deal more than this? In the United States there 
is one minister for every 700 souls. In China there is 
only one ordained minister for every million souls. We 
have 6,000,000 people in Greater New York. Supposing 
there were only six pastors and preachers for this entire 
city? Only six men to minister to these teeming mil- 
lions — to guide them with the wisdom of heaven, to open 
to them the teachings of God's blessed Word, to pray 
with them in sickness, to comfort them in sorrow and 
affliction, and to lead them into the knowledge of ever- 
lasting life. Let us remember as we make our mis- 
sionary offerings that that is the ratio in China and in 
other heathen nations of the world; and may our hearts 
expand with the noble impulse to help our needy brothers 
in more adequate and worthy ways than this. 

We have an abundance of v/ealth to-day with which 
to send missionaries and to establish schools and hospitals 
and to do everything else that needs to be done. Forty 
years ago America's national wealth was $40,000,000,- 
000, but that has increased by leaps and bounds until 
now the national wealth is between $200,000,000,000 
and $300,000,000,000. How much is that? We cannot 
even imagine it! One man has figured that there have 
not been 200,000,000,000 seconds since Adam. In other 
words, there have not been as many seconds of time in 
the recorded history of the human race as we have bil- 
lions of dollars in this marvelous land of ours. And if 



176 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

we gave to missions even a tithe of our extravagances, 
our missionary boards and societies would be embarrassed 
by the sudden flood of money. We made some wise 
economies during the war, but entered upon other fool- 
ish extravagances to offset them. We had wheatless and 
meatless meals, yet a recent Internal Revenue Depart- 
ment report showed that the number of cigars consumed 
in the United States within a year increased by about 
1,000,000,000, reaching the enormous total of 9,216,901,- 
113, or an average of 90 for every man, woman and child 
in the country! The number of cigarettes consumed 
within the same year increased more than 40 per cent., 
/Itotaling 30,529,193,338! We have been spending an- 
nually a billion dollars for tobacco and $2,400,000,000 
for strong drink. The showing in other directions is 
equally humiliating. We spent last year in America 
$800,000,000 for amusements, $200,000,000 for dogs, 
$800,000,000 for jewelry, $600,000,000 for automobiles, 
$300,000,000 for candy, $36,000,000 for soda water, and 
$26,000,000 for chewing gum! America spent more 
money for gum — think of it! — than all the churches of 
all denominations gave for foreign missions ! Must there 
not be a note of scorn in our Master's voice as He asks 
us again to-day: ''Why call ye me Lord, Lord, and do 
not the things I say?'' 

When we think of America's annual bill for selfish 
indulgences, it ought to bow us down with shame that 
we do so little for our Lord's great kingdom. The pastor 
of one of the largest Baptist churches of the South 
some time ago called the official board of the church to- 
gether, and told them that he wished to have a frank 
talk with them concerning the missionary campaign 
which was just beginning. He said to them, ''Brethren, 
do you realize that you officers of this church spend more 
every year for the mere upkeep of your automobiles than 



WORLD'S CRY— CHRISrS COMMAND 177 

you do for the world-wide kingdom of our Lord?" The 
deacons and trustees gasped in amazement, and were in- 
dined at first to resent the pastor's indictment; but he 
tactfully and earnestly pressed his point. He said, ^*Do 
not get offended at what I say, but take it to heart and 
see if it is not true. We will start with Deacon Blank. 
Deacon, would you mind telling us about how much 
your automobile costs you?" The deacon repHed, ''Well, 
Pastor, I w^ill answer you frankly. To start with, I pay 
my chauffeur $75.00 a month, and then come tire re- 
placement, gasoHne, oil, repairs, garage expenses, etc., 
and I would say that the machine certainly costs me an 
average of $125.00 a month, to say nothing of the initial 
investment in the car, which amounted to several thou- 
sand dollars." Then the deacon added, ''And I am franjk 
to say. Pastor, that I am ashamed of this showing. I 
certainly ought to spend more for the world-wide King- 
dom of my blessed Lord and Saviour than I pay for a 
machine for myself and my family to run around in." 
And so the pastor, as he went down the line of officers, 
found that he had very much underestimated instead of 
overestimated the situation, and they closed the meeting 
on their knees asking God to forgive them; and that 
year they had an offering for missions which was some- 
where in sight of what it ought to have been. 

I am more and m.ore profoundly convinced of the fact 
that the modern church must present a more consistent 
front to the world, or the world will pass us by in deri- 
sion and scorn. The world is thinking to-day in terms 
of big money, and w^e must learn to think the same way 
in our missionary enterprises. American Christians have 
been giving anually only about the price of one first-class 
warship for all the work of foreign missions! This 
can no longer be so. The day has passed when a man 
can maintain his standing in a church if he gives to the 



178 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Lord's work on Sunday only about as much as he has 
given away in ^^tips" during the week or spent for cigars. 
We must stop tipping God, and come to a basis 
of real giving. In such tremendous times as these, we 
dare not live longer for ourselves and let the suffering, 
sinning, dying world go with scarcely a thought or a really 
honest and worthwhile effort to help it. When we pro- 
fess to believe that 'Sve are not our own'' but that ''we 
have been bought with a price, even the shed blood of 
Christ," and vvhen we tell the world that Christianity 
means the Hfe of the cross — self-sacrifice in service — ^and 
then go on and spend ten times as much on our luxurious 
living and pleasures as we give to God's kingdom, we 
bear a false and most dam.aging witness to the world. 
The time has come when God is calling us back to the 
simplicity and power that made the early Christian church 
great and glorious; and there is no escaping the obliga- 
tion, either to go ourselves as missionaries, or else to 
give our money in such sum.s that we can send others to 
take our places. God give us the grace to see this 
truth and to discharge this duty! 

THE PROMISE OF VICTORY 

Let us turn now, in closing, to the cheering thought 
that Christ's command to us in this matter is reenforced 
by His promise of victory. Some say to-day : ''It is hope- 
less. The difficulties are too great. What are so few 
missionaries against so many heathen?" Ah, yes, but 
we need to understand the Master's relationship to it 
all. He said to His little handful of obscure and ignorant 
disciples, 'Tear not, little flock, for it is your Father's 
good pleasure to give you the kingdom," and inspired 
by that promise only, without money, or learning, or 
political prestige, that handful of rustics and fishermen 



WORLD^S CRY— CHRISrS COMMAND 179 

went out to capture the world! And how marvelously 
did they succeed ! 

And, beHeve me, we will succeed to-day, when we go 
in the same spirit which moved and inspired them, 
and with the same understanding of our relationship to 
our Divine Lord. Christ has never promised us that 
we are going to absolutely convert the entire world 
through the preaching of the gospel. He has commanded 
us to go and witness to Him, and He has promised that 
His Holy Spirit will then take out of the heathen world 
His own. Whether the numbers are great or small, we 
do not know. And then Christ has promised, in the 
fullness of His time and when we have completely done 
our dutv, to come back and finish the work of reo;en- 
crating and transforming the whole world. Ours, there- 
fore, is the preliminary work to the greatness of His final 
achievement, when * 'nations shall be born in a day.'' 

Yet even with the handicaps and difficulties which 
modern missions have had to face and overcome, how 
marvelous the progress has been. A hundred years ago, 
there were fewer than one hundred missionaries in the 
entire heathen world: to-day there are around 25,000. 
One hundred years ago, the Bible was translated into 
only 65 languages ; now it has been translated into over 
600 langtiages and dialects, and m.ade accessible to over 
800,000,000 of the human race. A hundred years ago, 
there were no medical missionaries, and more than two- 
thirds of the entire world was without adequate medical 
knowledge. To-day medical missionaries are numbered 
by the hundreds in all heathen lands, and they are treat- 
ing annually upward of four million patients. One hun- 
dred years ago there was a little handful of mission 
fields; to-day there are about thirty thousand missions, 
schools and colleges, educating a million five hundred 
thousand students in the great strategic centers of the 



i8o THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Orient. Sixty years ago there was not a professing 
Protestant Christian in Japan or Korea, less than fifty 
in the Chinese empire and a few thousand only in India. 
To-day there is a Protestant community of 75,000 ad- 
herents in Japan, over 200,000 in Korea, about a half 
million in China, and a million souls in India. Listen 
to this wonderful fact: it took nearly a century to win 
the first million Protestant Christians ; the second million 
were won within twelve years. It is taking less than six 
years to win the third million. 

In the face of this magnificent fruitage from the com- 
paratively small and insufficient effort which has been 
put forth, must we not see that yet greater things are 
possible for the rapid advance of Christ's kingdom, if 
His followers in this world are only found more faith- 
ful? It is not because of any weakness in our religion 
that we do not make more rapid strides in the conquest 
of the heathen world; it is only because we do not have 
missions on our hearts as we should ; it is only because V\^e 
do not give and do not pray and do not labor as we ought 
that the kingdom delays. It is the firm conviction of my 
own soul that Christ would have come back long since 
and would have completed the transformation of the 
whole world if His followers down the ages had only 
been more faithful. The trouble is we have been play- 
ing with the Lord's work, and putting this world, with 
its interests and its pleasures, first instead of His Divine 
Kingdom. But let us make no mistake in our thinking, 
the final conquest of this world for Christ is as sure as 
that yonder sun shines in the heavens. The goal of 
history is the redemption of the world, and it depends 
ill part upon us as to how soon that glorious consumma- 
tion will be brought to pass. 

Charles VI of Austria, before his death, secured from 
the rulers of Europe the agreement that his daughter 



WORLD'S CRY— CHRIST'S COMMAND 1 8 1 

Maria Theresa should succeed him upon the throne. 
This agreement is known in history as the ^'pragmatic 
sanction/' After Charles died, however, Frederick of 
Prussia did not hold to this agreement. With a duplicity 
and deceit that has always been characteristic of that race, 
he sought to get the throne for himself. By a quick 
movement of his armies into Austria he tried to prevent 
Maria from coming to her throne, but she fled from Aus- 
tria to Hungary and threw herself upon the mercy of 
her Hungarian nobles. It is said that she called them 
together in the council chamber and told them the story 
of her wrongs. She stood in the midst of them, beautiful 
woman that she w^as, and held her baby, the little prince, 
in her arms, as she made her appeal for justice. Her 
beauty, her tears, the little babe nesting against her breast 
and the obvious wrong and injustice of the situation, pro- 
foundly appealed to the chivalric Hungarian noblemen. 
When she finished her appeal, as one man they leaped 
to their feet and formed a circle about her and flashing 
their gleaming swords from their scabbards, they formed 
a canopy of steel above her head as they exclaimed, ''We 
will die for Alaria, our Queen!'' 

Oh, Christian brethren, noblemen of the court of 
heaven, there is a usurper upon the throne of this earth! 
The devil has enslaved and is seeking to dominate and 
rule the w^orld, and Christ is calling his disciples to fidel- 
ity. Let us highly resolve, each one of us, not that w^e 
will die for Christ our King, though we are willing to do 
that, if necessary, but, better still, let us resolve and say, 
"I will live for Christ, my King." Let us battle on until 
the kingdoms of this w^orld have indeed become the 
Kingdom of our Lord and His Christ! Let us give and 
suffer and serve until the w^orld is changed from a charnel- 
house of death, a hospital of disease, and a den of in- 
iquity, into a grand temple of light and love, in which 



1 82 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

Christ Himself shall rule in glory — a temple whose 
transept is from pole to pole, whose mighty dome is 
heaven, and whose music is the glad hosannah of re- 
deemed millions from every tribe and tongue and nation ! 



CHAPTER XIV 
THE LAW OF PR^WER 

THE KEY TO HAPPINESS AXD SUCCESS 

Text : "If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble 
themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked 
ways : then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and 
will heal their land." (ii Chron. 7:14.) 

This text occurs in connection with Solomon's pro- 
foundly beautiful prayer, offered at the dedication of the 
temple. Following these experiences, God revealed Him- 
self to Solomon, and the words of the text were given 
directly by God. This is one of the high points, there- 
fore, in the Bible where heaven bends low to earth, and 
we know that we have the verv' counsel of God Himself. 

The first great truth that this text makes plain to us 
is that God has a ''people." Again and again we have 
in the Scripture such expressions as, ''Oh, that my people 
would hearken unto me.'' and "Hear, oh, my people.'' 
To Pharaoh God said, "'Let my people go." And again 
He declares, "Surely they are my people." (Isa. 63:8.) 

God tried various plans in succeeding dispensations. 
God tried and tested man again and again. He tried 
Adam and Eve in the dispensation of innocence. When 
they failed, the race was wiped out, and God tried a 
new^ beginning in Xoah's day. And finally, in the full- 
ness of the times, God called out Abraham, and through 
him established a "peculiar people." When God perfected 
His marvelous plan of salvation, He determined to m^ake 

i8j 



1 84 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

it a partnership affair, and so He brought into being the 
Jewish nation and called them His people. Under the 
plan of God, they were to mediate salvation to the lost 
world, for through them the Messiah was to come. They 
were God's people, separated from the other nations and 
holy unto Him, — a nation of priests and servants of the 
Most High. 

Then, in the fullness of the times, the Messiah came, 
but God's own people rejected Him. "He came unto His 
own, but His own received Him not." But God still 
held to His plan of a partnership between Himself and 
man and of final redemption through a people peculiar 
to Himself. Therefore, when the Jews failed, Christ 
founded His church. He called out His apostles from 
the world, and through them built up His new people — 
the church — just as God called out Abraham from the 
world and through him built up His old people, the Jews. 
Thus, in the Acts of the Apostles, we are told specifically 
that God determined to take out of the Gentiles, "a people 
for His name." They, too, were to be a royal priesthood, 
a ''peculiar people," ''holding forth the light of life in 
the midst of a crooked and perverse generation." 

God's "people" to-day, therefore, are in His church, 
and just as in the old dispensation, the whole plan of 
God for that age depended upon the Jew, so in this dis- 
pensation, the whole plan of God depends upon the 
church. 

The condition, therefore, of this text applies to us to- 
day, and its promises are for us as really and truly as 
they were for Solomon and God's people in that far away 
time. God's plan still calls for a partnership and the 
word still is, "if my people which are called by my 
name." This means that if we fail, then God's plan 
must fail, because in His divine wisdom and sovereign 



THE LA\Y OF PRAYER iS^ 

power, He has elected to work through man for the sal- 
vation of a lost world. 



THE XEED OF HUMILITY 

God's work, tlien, fails if His people are not right, 
and vre need to understand now that the foundation fault 
of the people of God is always false pride, or, nega- 
tively, the lack of humility. And so God's direct call 
here is to humility, "if my people which are called by 
my name shall humble themselves.'' And never before 
in the long, sad history of humanity has this noble spirit 
of humility been needed as it is needed to-day. Again 
and again, through His prophets, God asks that searching 
question, ^*He hath shewed thee, O man, what is good; 
and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, 
and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?'' 
Yes, the spirit of humility was never so needed as to-day. 
\Yhat a terrible state the hmnan race has fallen into! 
Wasted by war, ravaged by revolution and now fainting 
with famine, the poor sin-cursed children of men are still 
staggering on in their haughtiness and vainglory. 

Thoughtful observers in every land are pointing out 
the ugliness of seltishness, false pride, and vainglory, at 
such a time as this. Anatole France has declared that 
'^Europe is dying," and he scathingly denounces the sins 
of the strong. George Bernard Shaw, Avith his biting 
irony, is bringing the same message. Sir Philip Gibbs, 
in blunt and outspoken fashion, is rebuking the upper 
classes of the people, and Sisley Huddleston, in a recent 
article in the Atlantic MontJiIy, has declared that "'the 
new rich are a rottenness in the marrow of society.'" 
And he has told us that the dancing and the flaring colors 
and the lewd dressing of the fashionable and the strong 



1 86 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

are a reproach, when the world is in sorrow and the 
shadow of starvation. 

Oh, how we need to bend in penitence and sympathy 
to-day! How haughty and vain we have been over our 
scientific achievements, our education, our culture and 
our boasted civilization ! Yet these things have not saved 
us from war and ruin. Oh, how we need to humble 
ourselves under the mighty hand of God, that in due 
season we may be exalted ! How we need the beauty of 
brotherhood, as over against autocracy and the ugliness 
of the class spirit! We have no right to expect much 
from the sinful, selfish world, rushing on in its mammon 
worship and its search after pleasure and vainglory; 
but God's people need to bow in the dust of real repen- 
tance and put on the sackcloth of that deep and genuine 
humility which alone can put human beings at the dis- 
posal of God, to be used for His high and holy ends. 

PRAYER IS THE PLAN 

Now, when we do thus become humble, we will pray. 
Self-sufficiency goes with false pride and vainglory. 
God-dependence is the inevitable corollary of humility 
and faith; and the greatest practical truth that we need 
to learn at this particular time in the history of the church 
is that prayer is God's plan. Prayer means power in our 
partnership with God, for He has ordained it so. 

God's plan for the material universe is what we call 
the attraction of gravitation. Through that mysterious 
but mighty power. He holds all things in balance. It is 
this power that keeps the earth true to its orbit as it 
swings around its central sun. It is this power which 
guides and controls every flaming world that goes flash- 
ing through infinite space. Whether we understand it 
or not, that is God's plan, and we must conform to it or 



THE LAW OF PRAYER 187 

suffer the consequences of nonconformity and disobedi- 
ence. If I violate the attraction of gravitation by step- 
ping off a precipice, I will surely plunge down and be 
destroyed. That is the plan, and neither my contrary 
notion about it nor my opposition to it will save me 
from paying the penalty if I violate natural law. 

In like manner, prayer is God's plan for the spiritual 
universe. Just so surely as God has ordained that the 
material world shall be controlled by the attraction of 
gravitation, so surely has He also ordained that the spirit- 
ual world shall be controlled by the power of prayer. 
And here also our failure to understand does not change 
the plan or alter the facts. And if we disregard or neg- 
lect God's prayer plan, we will inevitably suffer the 
spiritual consequences. If I go as a visitor to a strange 
city and stand in the middle of a block and hold my hand 
up for the car to stop, nothing happens. Car after car 
goes whizzing by. If I go to the far side of the street 
and hold up my hand, it is the same. Car after car passes 
by and not one will stop for me. If I cross over to the 
near side of the street and hold up my hand, at once the 
car will stop, and it will thus stop because that is the 
plan. 

I go as a guest to the home of a friend, but my room 
is in darkness and I am not familiar with the electric sys- 
tem. I may pull all of the window cords and open and 
close every drawer in the room, but still there will be 
no light. But if I call the child of my friend and ask 
him to turn on the lights, knowing just what to do and 
where to go, he steps over to the button and presses it, 
and instantly the room is flooded with light. The but- 
ton is the plan for light, and no light comes until the 
plan is complied with. I see an interesting little machine 
with a sign above it which says, ''Your correct weight 
for one cent. Stand on the platform and drop a penny 



1 88 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

in the slot." Well, I want to know my weight and so 
I am interested. I stand on the platform, but do not 
drop the penny in the slot, and nothing happens. I get 
off the machine and stand on the floor, and then drop a 
penny in the slot, and still nothing happens. But I read 
the directions again, then I stand on the platform, drop a 
penny in the slot, and instantly the index hand of the 
machine goes flying round, and it stops at my weight. 
I have met the conditions and the prayer is answered. 
And there is no other way for me to learn my weight, 
because the machine is built that way. 

And there is no other way for me to have spiritual 
peace and power except through prayer, because prayer 
is God's plan. Whether we understand it or not, whether 
we approve of it or not makes no difference. Prayer is 
God's plan, and we must conform to that. He has told 
us specifically that prayer is the only lever that releases 
the power of heaven. After making promise of many 
blessings to His people, God said, ''Yet will I be inquired 
of to do these things.'^ 

A father's heart 

It IS sometimes asked, ''Why does God require that 
we ask Him for those things which He knows men need 
and which He really desires to bestow?" There is more 
than one answer to that question. Our Lord did not 
appear to have this difficulty, for (see Matt. 6) He took 
this knowledge of God and His disposition to give as 
an encouragement to pray. But an extract from a letter 
of Sir Thomas Moore, in reply to his daughter's request, 
serves to illustrate: 

"You ask, my dear Margaret, for money with too much 
bashfulness and timidity, since you are asking from a 



THE LAW OF PRAYER 189' 

father who is eager to give; and since you have written 
to me a letter such that I would not only repay each line of 
it with a golden philippine, as Alexander did the verses 
of Cherilos, but if my means were as great as my desire, 
I would reward each syllable with two gold unciae. As 
it is, I send only what you have asked, but would have 
added more, only that, as I am eager to give, so I am de- 
sirous to be asked and coaxed by my daughter, especially 
by you, whom virtue and learning have made so dear to 
my soul. So the sooner you spend this money well, as 
you are wont to do, and the sooner you ask for more, 
the more you will be sure of pleasing your father." 

Every father will know what Sir Thomas Moors 
meant by this letter. I think that I have learned more 
from my five children than they ever learned from me, 
and I have found many illustrations of the profoundest 
religious truths in my relationship to those precious little 
people. A father's heart doe^ not like to see self-suffi- 
ciency on the part of a child. A father's heart rejoices 
in the sweet intimacies of fellowship between himself 
and his children, and he delights in nothing more than to 
hear the requests of the child and in love to grant them. 

And so God's heart responds to human prayer because 
He is our Father. His oft-repeated injunction is, ''Call 
unto me and I will answer thee and show thee great and 
mighty things which thou knowest not." ( Jer. 33 :3.) 

Christ's constant message was, ''Ask and ye shall re- 
ceive, seek and he shall find, knock and it shall be opened 
unto you." And the Apostolic injunction is, "Pray with- 
out ceasing." We are not only to be much upon our 
knees in formal prayer to God, but we are to live in the 
very atmosphere of fellowship and devotion. 

So, negatively, Christ warned His followers by saying, 
"Apart from me ye can do nothing" ; and, positively, He 
encouraged them by saying, "He that believeth on me. 



190 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

the works that I do shall he do also, and even greater 
works shall he do, because I go unto the Father." These 
greater works were to be possible unto us because He 
went unto the Father as our Mediator. Not only have 
we the Father, therefore, to hear our petitions, as under 
the old dispensation, but we have Christ the Son as our 
Mediator, pleading now before the Father the merits of 
His own shed blood and the sufficiency of His own fin- 
ished work upon the cross. And we have also the Holy 
Spirit to make ''intercession for us with groanings that 
cannot be uttered.'' 

Then after Christ made to His followers His promise 
that they were to do greater works because He was going 
unto the Father, He explained to them, in more clear and 
definite ways, that their chief responsibility, in this part- 
nership business of saving men with Him, was prayer. 
Eight times during His last conversation with His fol- 
lowers, as recorded in John fourteen to seventeen, He 
declared, 'Tf ye ask ... I will do.'' 

God alone can save men, but God cannot save men 
alone, for we are His ambassadors. God's plan requires 
man. In His infinite wisdom, God has limited His power 
to save men in proportion to our willingness to ask, 
because, in His wisdom, He made this business a partner- 
ship. God in some way permitted a restraint to be put 
upon Himself. Again be it said that we may not under- 
stand it, but nevertheless it is true that God has condi- 
tioned His doing upon our asking. 'Tf, if, if." This 
is the word that tells us that we may limit God. If we 
ask, in beheving prayer, His marvelous power is released 
and set to work. If we do not ask. His power is re- 
strained and limited. Power to save souls belongs to 
God only, and intercession is the one and only means 
of touching and releasing that power. It is the button 



THE LAW OF PRAYER 191 

that alone can flood the world with spiritual light. Prayer 
is the power on earth that propels the power of heaven. 



GOD STILL WAITS FOR INTERCESSORS 

^God, therefore, waits to-day, as He has ever waited, 
for intercessors. He is limited in what He can do for 
New York, for America, and for the lost world because 
of the fewness of those who really pray. As in the an- 
cient time, God is saying to-day, ''And I sought for a 
man among them that should build up the wall and stand 
in the gap before me for the land that I should not destroy 
it, but I found none." (Ez. 22 :30.) The grieved amaze- 
ment of Heaven is expressed again in that startling say- 
ing, ''And He saw that there was no man, and wondered 
that there was no intercessor." (Isa. 59:16.) And 
meeting this amazement of heaven, we hear the broken- 
hearted complaint of the devout follower of God upon 
the earth when he saw the people's lack of prayer : "There 
is none that calleth upon thy name, that stirreth up him- 
self to take hold of thee." (Isa. 64:7.) 

Our responsibility here in New York, oh, my friends, 
is tremendous. It is overwhelming ! As it needs nothing 
else. New York needs the saving power* of God. There 
are here seven millions of human beings, 70 per cent, of 
whom, according to the records, are without reHgion, at 
least as measured by connection with any sort of religious 
organization, either Jewish, Catholic or Protestant. 
What a challenge and what a call! For these 70 out of 
every 100 of our population have in common with all 
humanity the right to know Jesus Christ as a personal 
Saviour, as a Living God, who will transform, sweeten 
and glorify their lives. Oh, how New York needs the 
Gospel, for verily these millions are like sheep without a 



192 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

shepherd. God is wilHng, God is ready, God is able to 
give them what they need. 

Why, then, does He wait? He waits for the faithful 
intercession of His people. He waits for the power of 
prevailing prayer. He waits to be inquired of, for that 
is His plan, and until His people pray, God's power 
cannot be known. For not until they pray, can the people 
themselves be prepared to do spiritual work. 

And the challenge and the call are sounding in our 
ears. Listen again to Christ: ''Say not ye there are 
four months and then cometh the harvest ? Behold, I say 
unto you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, for 
they are white already to harvest." 

Is God ready, then, for a great reaping in New York? 
Is He eager for a spiritual awakening in the church that 
will bring in a mighty harvest of souls, that will inspire 
a real missionary zeal, that will promote a genuine sepa- 
ration from the world, and that will produce a true con- 
secration of our money to God? Yes, God is ready! 
He only waits for His partners to arouse themselves 
from sleep and indifference and selfishness and lukewarmi- 
ness and worldHness, and to become alive to their part 
in these tremendous tasks. With this mighty harvest 
waiting, our Saviour is saying directly to us, 'Tray ye 
therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he may send 
forth laborers into his harvest." 

Yes, Jesus is waiting for intercessors. His Word to 
us is : "If ye ask ... I will do." Just as truly as the 
outpouring of Pentecost depended upon the waiting 
prayer of those disciples, so does a Pentecostal outpour- 
ing upon America and the world wait upon the prevail- 
ing prayer of God's people to-day. All of the great 
revivals in the history of the church have been born in 
prayer. We cannot take here the time to review these 
unusual works of grace and these times of spiritual 



THE LAW OF PRAYER 193 

quickening. W'e must pass by the great awakening- under 
the Wesleys and \\'hite£eld, the revival that folk-^wed the 
haystack prayer meetings, the \\'elsh revival, tlie great 
movement tinder ^Moody, and the remarkable revivals in 
India and Korea: but let us go to the fountainhead of 
all authority, and hear what the Word of God itself says. 
Listen to Acts 4:^1. ^2, ^;-:;r: "And when thev had 
prayed . . . they were all filled witli the Holy Ghost . . . 
neither said any of them that aught of tlie things wliich 
he possessed was his own." So prayer is the way to the 
revival of stewardship and proper Ghristian giving, about 
which we have been hearing so much, and which, accord- 
ing to God's Word, is always a prelude to spiritual 
revival. 

A POWER THAT GUIDES 

Again, prayer, puts us in the way of the guidance of 
the Holy Spirit, who will lead us to souls that are lost. 
Philip was in the spirit of prayer in his great meeting 
at Samaria, when the Holy Ghost directed him to go to 
Gaza, which was desert, and there he found the Ethiopian 
eunuch and led him. to Christ. Just as surely as the spirit 
guided in that case, even up to the point of saying, "Go 
near, and join thyself to this chariot," just so surely will 
prayer- bring us the infilling of the Holy Spirit who will 
lead us to the goaJ of soul-winning success. 

^ly dear friend, ]\Irs. E. 3.1. AMiittemore. told me. in 
most touching fashion, the story of how slie was used 
directly of the Holy Spirit in answer to prayer, to reach 
and redeem* a lost girl — lost physically as well as spirit- 
ually. ]\Irs. AMiittemore received from one of the Ger- 
man cities on February 14, 1S03, a letter from a broken- 
hearted father, in which he said : 

''Will you, for God's sake, find my poor girl in 
America? She has straved awav from home, broken her 



194 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

poor old mother's heart, and caused mine to become 
almost crushed. Her name is ^Margaret. If you find her, 
tell her we love her still, and she can come home and will 
have a welcome. Oh, for God's sake, find her if you can. 
We have heard of your work and thought you might do 
this, for she is in America.'' 

Mrs. \\^hittemore then told me how amazed and per- 
plexed she was to receive such a letter, lo ask her to find 
a lost girl without even giving her the city where she 
was supposed to be. ''In America'' was the only direction 
she had. She said that the very impossibility of it from 
any human standpoint threw her back upon God. She 
had been greatly touched by the pathetic appeal of the 
letter, and having dealt with many wayward girls in the 
''Door of Hope" home, which she had founded in New 
York, she had a yearning, motherly sympathy for them 
all. So she asked God to work a miracle and to guide 
her to Ivlargaret. 

Then she said that that very afternoon, an urgent 
call came to her to come and lead a religious service in 
another city. There were other duties which seemed to 
be imperative, and yet she said she was led to turn from 
those duties and to cancel another engagem.ent that she 
might respond to this urgent invitation that had come. 
So she Vv^ent, and as she gave the address, she noticed a tall 
girl standing near the back door, and even while she was 
speaking, she was attracted to that particular girl out of 
all the people present. And when the meeting was ov^, 
she made her way to. the rear and greeted that girl, and 
asked her her name. The girl replied, "My name is 
Margaret." And Mrs. Whittemore exclaimed, "Alar- 

garet! Oh, child, Margaret what? Margaret ?" 

And she answered, "Yes." And then Mrs. Whittemore 
read her father's letter to her, and the brokenhearted 
girl, melted by the power of the Holy Spirit, returned 



THE LAW OF PRAYER 195 

with Mrs. Whittemore to the ''Door of Hope" in New 
York, and then was sent back to the waiting home and 
the loving hearts on the other side of the sea. 

Yes, prayer will give us the guidance of the Holy 
Spirit, and not only that, it will bring the power of 
God to bear upon hard human hearts and stubborn wills, 
so that there will be genuine conversion through our 
faithful efforts. When Philip found the eunuch, he 
found him searching the Scriptures and seeking the way 
of life. Because, you see, God, our divine partner, never 
shirks His duties and never half way does His work. 
The same Holy Spirit who called Philip and told him 
to go into the desert to the eunuch, w^as also working 
in the heart of the eunuch, causing him to search the 
Scriptures, and thus opening the w^ay for the work of the 
evangelist in leading him to the Saviour. 

The first convert in Europe was won after prayer, 
(See Acts 16:13-15.) Paul and Silas prayed at midnight 
in prison, and the jailer gave his heart to Jesus Christ. 
(Acts 16:25-34.) 

Prayer will give power to preaching and personal tes- 
timony not only for the saving of individuals like the 
eunuch and Margaret, but prayer will bring the power 
of God to the minds and hearts of multitudes so that they 
will be illuminated by divine truth and led to turn from 
idols to worship the living God. So it is Avritten again : 
'They went up into an upper room ... all continued with 
one accord in prayer. . . . The same day there were added 
unto them about three thousand souls/' (Acts i :i3-i4, 
2:41, 6:7.) 

And this same power that wrought so marvelously 
in the early church in answer to prayer still waits upon 
our praying. Prayer that does not expect an answer is 
not true prayer and causes others to stumble. Chas. G. 
Finney used to tell the stor\' of hoAV, before his conver- 



196 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

sion, members of the church in his home town would ask 
him if he did not want them to pray for him. '1 told 
them no," said Finney, ^'because I did not see that God 
answered their prayers/' Then he said to them further, 
*'You have been praying for a revival of religion ever 
since I have been in Adams, and yet you have it not. 
You have been praying for the Holy Spirit to descend 
upon yourselves, and yet you still complain of your 
leanness." This inconsistency, the fact that they prayed 
so much and yet were not ansvs^ered, was a sad stumbling 
block to him. The trouble was that it was mere per- 
functory praying, — that heathen repetition against which 
Jesus warns. We need the unction and the power of 
the Holy Spirit in our prayers, and then we will have 
the right to claim the answer. No Christian ought to be 
content with unanswered prayers, for God has promised 
to answer when we call. And Chas. G. Finney, though 
he had been an infidel lawyer, when he was at last con- 
verted, developed a real prayer life. He felt that God 
had called him to preach. He did not go to a theological 
seminary, but he did take time to wait upon God. We 
are told that every day at two o'clock he shut himself 
up for two hours vs^ith God. No matter what occurred, 
he directed that he was not to be interrupted and that 
no one should see him. No wonder that God girded that 
infidel lawyer so that he not only shook America but Eng- 
land as well, and though he has been dead now for these 
many years, Chas. G. Finney is working still because he 
knew the secret of prevailing prayer. 

TURNING FROM WORLDLINESS 

Now, our text makes plain the truth that the one thing 
which stands in the way of all of this for us is our 
pride, our selfishness, and our worldliness. 'Tf my people 



THE LAW OF PRAYER 197 

which are called by my mrr.e shall hu::::lr :::r:::5e> z5 :-,:\i 
pray and seek my face and turn from their wickei ' :/ s. 
then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sns 
and will heal their land.'' 

That means, dear friends, a turr ing- a" :, v :::::: vrrli- 
liness to God in heartfeh and earnest h \\ ?:r a: h.s: 
it is only the things that we desire in . ur ieejer s:vhi 
that we really seek and ask for. Xapoleon desired power. 
and his whole life was a practical prayer in his search 
for earthly glorja Edison has desired knowledge, and, 
thxTGugh weary hours, he has labored in his laboratory, 
living a practical prayer by his acti\4ties, and thus seek- 
ing until he fotmd the phonograph and his other mar- 
velous inventions. The societ}- woman's desire is for 
adoration and social success, and regardless of the indi- 
\4dual things for which she prays with her lips, her v.hrle 
life is a prayer for these other things, because she gh.es 
her time and strength in seeking after them. W'h.a: she 
really desires, she seeks ::r. So the promise is, "'?lessea 
are those who do hunger and thirst after rig;h:e: usness. 
for they shall be filled." 

And Christ calls upon us for persistence and b.cca-re: 
earnestness in prayer. He reds ns. in that wonderid 
parable. *Tor the sake of his importunity, he will arise 
and give him as many as he needs " And ae^"^ ^nr-ning 
from parables. He says cir^:ny :a us. "' nn^s 

sover ye desire, when ye pray, believe :ha: ye receive 
them, and ye shall have them." The Greek 'r:::i here 
translated "desire" is an interesting ward. I: is :he same 
word which Tajnes and John used v:'r.^r. : e can e a 
Jesus and asked that they m:a"h: sir ane an Ihhs riaan 
and one on His left in His g^irry In innrhanna hi;.: 
request, they said: ddas:er, .e v :ala n:a: y:a ^i::ala 
do for us whatsaever that v;e shah a/ai^aa" I: is die 
same word vdaah^:: is used when the n:ui:i:udes. sur^in^ 



198 THE GARDENS OE LIFE 

about Pilate, asked that He release Barabbas unto them, 
and ''crying aloud began to desire him to do as he had 
ever done unto them." With the overmastering passion 
of human ambition, or with an earnestness like that of 
the mob when it imperatively demands the thing that it 
desires, so are we to pray. ''What things soever ye de- 
sire'' — not your passing whim, not your superficial wish, 
but that deep hunger of soul which we call desire — that 
it is which will bring in the Holy Spirit and give us 
the power of God. 

THE HEALING OF THE LAND 

And through this power God will forgive our sins 
and heal the land. "If my people, which are called by 
my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek 
my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I 
hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will 
heal their land." And, oh, how the land needs healing 
to-day! I will not again recount the pathetic, woeful 
needs of our poor war-wasted humanity. In the begin- 
ning I touched upon that, but our hearts all know to-day 
that the land needs the gracious touch of the great Physi- 
cian before the wounds of war can be healed, before 
injustice can be banished, and before peace and plenty 
and righteousness can reign. 

There is a transforming and a transfiguring power 
in prayer. In connection with Christ's transfiguration, 
we are told that, "While He prayed. He was transfigured 
before them." The very brightness and beauty of heaven 
came flooding in upon Him, until His face shone with 
divine radiance and His very raiment became "white and 
glistening." And after that transfiguration beauty that 
was born of prayer, He went down into the dark valley 



THE LAW OF PRAYER 199 

of human need and had the power to heal the lunatic 
boy. 

I can never forget the occasion of my first visit to 
this beautiful city of New York. It was during my col- 
lege days, and I came up as a student to attend the 
World's Fair at Buffalo. During that visit, I went over 
and looked for the first time upon the m.ajestic beauty 
of Niagara Falls. I stood lost in awe and wonder look- 
ing upon that matchless panorama, and I saw there that 
men were making a prayer to the Falls. They had put 
their turbine wheels where the tons of rushing water 
would fall upon them, and those turbines moved the 
mighty dynamos that furnished light and power to fac- 
tories and cities far and near. 

Those of you who visited the Buffalo Fair will remem- 
ber the central attraction — that remarkable electric tower 
which was called ''The Tower of Jewels." It was cov- 
ered over with millions of electric light bulbs in every 
color of the rainbow. They were hung about it like fes- 
toons and garlands, and the solid surfaces of the tower 
itself were encrusted with these lights, until it literally 
looked like a tower of flashing jewels. 

As the day died away and the shadows of night began 
to fall across the earth, the multitudes who were visiting 
the great Fair would gather in the central plaza, facing 
the tower, and then, at a given signal, the electric switch 
was turned on and the tower began to glow with light, — 
soft and subdued at first, but as connection after connec- 
tion was made, it shone out with increasing brightness 
and beauty until at last it stood outlined against the eve- 
ning sky, flaming with dazzling beauty — a fit diadem 
for a god ! 

But the secret of it all was what I had looked upon 
yonder at the foot of the mighty Falls. The thundering 
waters of Niagara shifted their burden to steel rods and 



200 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

turning wheels, and the electric current, leaping along 
the willing wires, climbed up through the heart of the 
waiting tower and smiled out in a thousand tender tints 
upon the thrilled and applauding multitudes below. Far 
and near the darkness was banished and the world was 
transformed with beauty. 

And God is waiting now for His people, who are called 
by His name, to humble themselves and pray and seek 
His face and turn from their wicked ways, and join up 
with the beauty of His holiness and the majesty of His 
power, and then He will hear from Heaven and will for- 
give our sins and will heal our land. 



CHAPTER XV 
THE GOSPEL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 

A FRIEXD WHO NEVER FAILS US 
Text: 'The spirit said." 

The Book of Acts is the biography of the Holy 
Spirit. Just as Jesus has His biography in the four 
Gospels, so the Holy Spirit, the third person in the blessed 
trinity, has recorded the story of His life. It is also 
interesting to note that as Jesus' life in the flesh covered 
thirty-three years, so also the Book of Acts covers about 
thirty-three years of the earthly activities of the Holy 
Spirit. 

The book breaks off abruptly; it is not complete, be- 
cause the administration of the Holy Spirit in this 
world has not yet ended. Enough was recorded, how- 
ever, to give us a Avell-rounded view — a cross-section as 
it were — of the Spirit's activities in this dispensation. 

The Book of Acts, therefore, may be termed the 
GOSPEL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. When wc Speak of a Gospel, 
however, we mean two things : first, we mean a record ; 
and, second, we means a message. The four Gospels 
of Christ are records of His marvelous life in this world; 
but they are more than that — they are also messages to 
us and to all men. They are: '"Gospels" because they are 
good news, for that is what the word ''gospel'' means. 

In this same way, the Gospel of the Holy Spirit is not 
merely a record, it is also a message — it is "good news" 
for us. 

201 



202 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

What, now, are the elements in this gospel — this good 
news about the Holy Spirit ? 

AN INFALLIBLE GUIDE 

First of all, the Gospel of the Holy Spirit is the good 
news that in Him we have an infallible Guide. \Vhat 
wonderful good news it is that God has not left us to 
stumble on in uncertainty and darkness, but that He has 
given us a safe, sure Guide. The promise of Christ was, 
''Howbeit, when He the Spirit of Truth has come. He 
will guide you into all the Truth" (Johri.-J:4il3JL- This 
is one reason why Jesus said that it was ''expedient" that 
He should go away. 

How wonderfully was fulfilled this promise of Jesus 
that He would send the Spirit to guide us into all Truth ! 
All through the Acts we find such expressions as ''The 
Spirit said,'' "It pleased the Holy Spirit," "The Spirit 
w^ould not suffer them to go," etc., and Peter was given 
a revelation of God's Truth that God is "no respecter 
of persons." Thus divine wisdom brought about the 
breaking down of the "middle wall of a partition be- 
tween Jew and Gentile." Thus was Christianity made a 
universal rehgion, instead of merely an enlarged Judaism. 
Paul, in his human wisdom, was planning to turn back 
into Asia ]\Iinor, but the Spirit directly intervened, and 
through the vision of the man of ^vlacedonia, Paul was 
directed to cross over into Europe. Thus Christianity was 
brought into the strong, virile West, instead of being 
turned back upon the dreamy effeminate East. God's 
wisdom, through the guidance of the Holy Spirit, pre- 
vailed, instead of man's judgment, founded upon the short 
vision of the flesh. 

If Paul had followed his own judgment and gone back 
to the province of Asia, and then on perhaps to the further ' 



GOSPEL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 203 

East, to the continent of Asia, doubtless India and China 
would be sending missionaries to us to-day instead of our 
sending missionaries to them. 

It is noticeable, too, that trouble cam.e whenever those 
early Christians neglected or disobeyed the leadership 
of the Holy Spirit. The selection of Matthias, for ex- 
ample, as one of the Apostles, to take the place of Judas, 
is a good illustration of this. The whole plan seemed 
to be a man-made plan. They decided to select two — 
thus limiting the matter — and then they agreed to deter- 
mine ''by lot'' — a sort of chance — which one of these 
should be elected an Apostle; and all of this was done 
before they prayed about it at all. (See Acts i \2y26,) 
They did what we are so prone to do to-day — they made 
a plan, in their human wisdom, and then asked God to 
direct as to their plan. It was a typical piece of what 
we should call to-day '^committee work," all planned out 
before they prayed. 

The result was that Matthias v/as thus selected by lot, 
and we never hear of him afterward! He must have 
been a complete cipher. He was elected and then he 
disappears entirely from view. We have no record of 
anything that he ever accomplished for the cause of 
Christianity as an Apostle, but later Christ Himself called 
Paul, as a real Apostle, to fill the ranks, and ever since 
the world has been full of the record of his glorious deeds. 

In connection, too, with the selection of deacons, there 
are indications that the guidance of the Holy Spirit was 
not sought. There are some indications of impatience, or 
even anger, over the matter; and so they selected their 
deacons to look after the practical details of administra- 
tion, but the Holy Spirit seems to have interfered with 
all of this. We see Stephen and Philip, for example, — 
two of these deacons who were thus selected, — turned 
into great preachers. Instead of allowing their wonder- 



204 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

ful talents and powers to be used in mere administrative 
details of an incidental character, the Holy Spirit laid. 
His hand upon them and developed them into two of 
the greatest preachers of all time. The sermon of 
Stephen, as recorded in the Seventh Chapter of Acts, is 
a model, both in its wonderful historic perspective, and 
its marvelous spiritual power, and we have the record 
of how Philip was led of the Spirit over into Samaria 
where he conducted a glorious work of grace in which 
many were saved. 

We have another illustration of embarrassment and 
failure when the direct guidance of the Holy Spirit was 
neglected. In the Twenty-first Chapter of Acts, we have 
the account of how Paul went up to Jerusalem, despite 
the warnings of the Holy Spirit; and, so far as we can 
tell from the record, the trip was utterly useless. He lost 
valuable time, and suffered unnecessary persecution, and 
nothing was accomplished, because he persisted in going 
on despite the Spirit's warnings. 

So our confusion to-day always comes about because 
we do not seek first the guidance of the Holy Spirit All 
differences over doctrine, all splits into denominations, all 
the abortive ''Movements," which have so dissipated 
the real powers of the modern church, have come about 
because men in their wisdom have set up their judgments 
and their opinions, instead of following the revealed will 
of God, through His Word, and the direct guidance of 
the Holy Spirit, secured through prayer. There is too 
much dependence to-day on human ''efficiency'' and too 
little dependence upon divine power. 

There was an incident in the New York Baptist Min- 
isters' Conference some time ago that was illuminative. 
A brother came over to ask suggestions from the con- 
ference on "the report of the committee on findings 
ON INDUSTRIAL UNREST." It was in conncction with 



J I 



GOSPEL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 205 

the Inter-Church A\''orld ]\Iovement, and the brother 
read a long report which had been prepared at a ''group 
conference'' in one of the big hotels. It was full of 
hair-splitting theories and man-made suggestions about 
possible compromises, and so forth, that might pro- 
duce harmony between labor and capital and allay the 
present industrial unrest. There was not a. scriptural 
quotation in the w^hole thing, nor was there any ap- 
peal to Bible truth. It was manifestly the product 
of human wisdom. After some discussion, and various 
suggestions of striking out this word, or substituting this 
phrase or clause for that, I ventured to offer a ''Sub- 
stitute Finding." I read to them Acts 2:41-47, and 
moved that the conference recommend to the "Committee 
on Findings'' that they use that as their "report." 
Amid much laughter, the visiting brother gave up his 
effort to have this report patched up, and I contend that 
the substitute report which I ventured to suggest will 
really solve these problems, if we only have the faith and 
the grace to apply it. It is as follows : 

"Then they that gladly received his word were bap- 
tized : and the same day there were added unto them about 
three thousand souls. And they continued stedfastly in 
the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, and in breaking of 
bread, and in prayers. And all that believed were to- 
gether, and had all things in common; and sold their 
possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as 
every man had need. And they, continuing daily with 
one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house 
to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness 
of heart, praising God, and having favor with all the 
people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as 
should be saved." 

May I say further that not only is the truth of God 
the only hope for healing industrial unrest and solving the 



2o6 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

problems between labor and capital, and all other class 
issues of to-day, but the only hope for real Christian 
unity is to depend upon the Spirit to guide us into all the 
truth. When all Christians everywhere come to their 
knees at the foot of the cross, as we are led of the Holy 
Spirit, we will be automatically back together. Chris- 
tian unity can never be brought about upon a basis of 
mere expedience or good fellowship, or financial economy, 
or compromise. We cannot unite on minimum.s of faith; 
we can unite on maximums of faith. We will never 
come together through each side w^hittling down its con- 
victions to the smallest possible point, until neither side 
believes very much; we can come together when we all 
believe tremendously in God's Word, in the sufficiency 
of a living Christ, and in the direct guidance of the Holy 
Spirit, for he will bring us into all the truth. What a 
blessed Gospel it is that we have indeed an infallible 
Guide ! 

A HEAVENLY COMFORTER 

Again, the Gospel of the Holy Spirit is the good news 
that we have a heavenly comforter. Jesus said, */I will 
pray the Father and he will give you another comforter 
that he may abide with you forever" (John 14:16). 
Again he said, that we should have ''the comforter, even 
the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name'' 
(John 14:26). 

For one thing, the Holy Spirit is our comforter in 
perplexity. As He guides us into all the truth, He takes 
from us the burden of our troubled minds. The Holy 
Spirit brings to us the teaching of Jesus to lead us out 
of our perplexity and uncertainty, for Jesus promised 
us that ''the Holy Spirit will bring all things to your 
remembrance whatsoever I have said unto you." 

This help of the Spirit has been well likened to the 



GOSPEL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 207 

work of the farmer in storing his barns with hay and 
then supplying the needs of his stock when the cold and 
the hunger of winter have come. Those of us who have 
lived upon a farm appreciate the beauty of this thought. 
We have seen the harvest time, when the fragrant hay 
was loaded on the wagons and then stored away in the 
loft of the barn. Then the winter would come, with its 
barrenness and cold, and we have seen the close of the 
hard day's work, when the weary horses were neighing 
in their stalls hungry for the evening meal ; and then we 
have gone up into the hayloft and pushed down great 
armsful of the sweet clover and timothy, and packed 
the hayrack full of it, that every horse and cow might 
have an abundance. 

And so Jesus has given the rich treasures of His truth, 
and the Holy Spirit takes of these things of Christ and 
shows them unto us when we are perplexed and weary 
in mind. We have a touch of it in John 20:22, where 
it is written: ^'When therefore He was risen from the 
dead. His disciples remembered that He had said this 
unto them, and they believed the Scripture and the words 
which Jesus had said.'' And again, in John 12:16, it 
is written : ^^These things understood not His disciples 
at the first, but when Jesus was glorified, then remem- 
bered they that these things were written of Him and 
that they had done these things unto Him.'' 

Thus the blessed Holy Spirit took the teachings of the 
Word and used them to remove the clouds of uncertainty 
and perplexity from the minds of the followers of Jesus 
and to lead them into all truth. And so the Holy Spirit 
takes of the things of Christ to-day — perhaps some truth 
that was stored away in our memory in the long ago — 
and brings them to us when we are perplexed and 
burdened, and thus we are fed and comforted. 

We have had many remarkable illustrations of God's 



2o8 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

saving grace and power, through the street preaching 
services of Calvary Baptist Church in New York. Let 
me give you one striking illustration ot how the Holy 
Spirit takes of the things of the past and uses them in the 
present to help us : A group of our young people dur- 
ing one summer held services each afternoon at the corner 
of 33d Street and Eighth Avenue, New York. When 
they went to that corner one afternoon, they found that 
the Salvation Army — not knowing that it was our custom 
to hold services there — had come to the corner, and they 
were already under way with a largely attended meeting. 
Our group of workers, therefore, moved up Eighth 
Avenue two blocks, and they did not hold the meeting 
on the west side of the street, as they were always accus- 
tomed to do, but they were led to cross over and they 
held the meeting on the east side. There was a saloon 
at that corner, and while the young people were singing 
in the early part of the service, the back door of the 
saloon swung open and a young girl cam.e out and not 
only stopped with the crowd of people who had gathered, 
but she stepped into the circle of singers and joined with 
us in singing the beautiful old hymn. Later in the meet- 
ing, when an invitation was given, she came forward to 
confess Christ, and she told us a touching story in giving 
her experiences afterward, when she came to the church. 
She had come up to New York from one of the smaller 
towns of the State, because of the poverty in her home. 
She had done well until she was stricken down with a 
long spell of sickness, in which all of her little surplus 
of money was used up. When she recovered, she found 
it difficult to get work because she was still weak and 
nervous. It was the same old story. She drifted deeper 
and deeper into discouragement, until at last despair 
gripped her heart and she went into the saloon that after- 
noon determined to give it all up and throw her life 



GOSPEL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 209 

away. When she was in the very act of raising a glass 
^of whiskey to her Hps, as she sat in dejection in the back 
room of the saloon, she said that suddenly she heard the 
strains of one of the songs of the church which she had 
learned back in the old home town when she was a little 
child in the Sunday school. The sweet strains of that 
familiar hymn arrested her hand and changed her purpose, 
and it was then that she burst out of the door and came 
into our circle of Christian workers and found Christ 
as her Saviour. 

Oh, yes, the blessed Holy Spirit is our comforter in 
perplexity, and even in our despair takes of the things of 
Christ and shows them unto us ! 

And how blessedly true it is that He is likewise our 
comforter in sorrow. The disciples were stricken with 
grief at the time of the ascension of Jesus. Once they had 
lost Him, and in discouragement and despair they had 
gone back to their fishing nets and their daily tasks 
thinking that the bright dream w^as over. But then .had 
come the glad tidings that He was risen from the dead, 
and they had met Him, and for forty wonderful days 
they had walked and talked with Him. But that day, as 
He ascended from them upon the IMount of Olives, they 
looked up sorrow stricken and dumb with agony, '^gazing 
into heaven.'' Doubtless they were thinking, ''Oh, now 
He is gone forever,'' but the Holy Spirit w^as already 
working to lead them into all truth. It was through His 
power that their earthly vision was quickened, so that 
they could see the heavenly visitors and hear them say: 
*'Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? 
This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven 
shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into 
heaven" (Acts i :ii). 

What comfort and cheer this must have brought to 
their burdened hearts, and the Holy Spirit as our com- 



2IO THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

forter still brings the truths of God to ease the burden 
in the time of our heartbroken grief. 

During my pastorate in the city of Baltimore, I lost 
a dear friend, one of the honored deacons of the church 
and the superintendent of our Sunday school. He was 
a strong and noble man of God, greatly beloved by the 
church and community. He was in the vigor and full- 
tide of health and strength, but he was stricken down 
most unexpectedly with pneumonia; and, as is often the 
case with that dread disease, though he was a man of 
rugged physique, he was swept quickly away. As pastor, 
it then fell to my lot to try to say words of comfort to 
his wife. I have never had a harder task; for I have 
never known two people who were more completely de- 
voted to each other. That wife literally adored her 
strong and noble husband, and though my heart was full 
of sympathy, I shrank somewhat from the ordeal of 
meeting her after I received the word of his sudden 
death. But when I went into the room where she was 
sitting, every vestige of anxiety left me. She was very 
calm and very serene with that strength which only a 
Christian knows, and as I tried to say some words to 
her, in a rather halting way, she looked at me and said, 
**Now, Pastor, it is all right. I must not be selfish about 
this. God gave me Ed for eighteen years, and I walked 
by his side in pride and perfect human happiness and 
then God wanted him over in His home, for some greater 
service there than he could perform here, and so I must 
give him up for a little season. But I know that I shall 
see him again, because Jesus promises to take all of those 
who love Him unto Himself in the mansions of God, and 
He has assured us that where He is, we will be also ; and 
there I shall rejoin Ed and be with him forever!'' 

Thus the Holy Spirit took of the things of Christ and, 
for her comfort, showed them unto her. 



GOSPEL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 211 

A DIVINE HELPER 

Again, the Gospel of the Holy Spirit is the good news 
that we have a divine helper who will assist us in all 
of our undertakings and who, in His heavenly might, will 
bring to pass the things that we cannot accomplish alone. 
Jesus said, ''The works that I do ye shall do also; and 
greater works than these shall ye do, because I go to 
my Father." He meant by this that through His going 
to the Father the Holy Spirit would be sent to render 
assistance to His faithful friends and workers, the world 
over. 

We are called to be ''fellow workers with God'' not 
merely "workers together,'' as the old version had it, but 
"fellow workers," with partnership rights and interests. 
Different groups of laborers — plumbers, carpenters, brick- 
layers, etc., may be "workers together" on a building, 
without any mutual interests, but if they all belong to a 
cooperative partnership, then they are "fellow workers," 
with the reciprocal advantages and privileges which that 
name implies. 

So God, our divine Partner, has called us into fellow- 
ship with Himself, and He has promised to help us, 
through the Holy Spirit, that we may truly help others. 
So it IS written : "We are ambassadors for Christ as 
though God did beseech you by us : we pray you in 
Christ's stead, be ye reconciled to God" (Second Corin- 
thians 5 :2o) ; and again we are told in First Corinthians 
12 .7, that "the manifestations of the Spirit are given to 
every man to profit with all." 

Conebear and Hov/son give a beautiful translation of 
this verse in their "Life and Epistles of Paul," as fol- 
lows : "The gift whereby the Spirit is made manifest is 
given to each for the profit of dV Whatever gifts, 
therefore, are bestowed upon us, which make manifest 



212 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

the Holy Spirit dwelling in us, are given not for our own 
selfish enjoyment or upbuilding, but for others — ''for the 
profit of all." 

Then it goes on, in the following verses, to indicate that 
''to one is given through the Spirit the word of w^isdom, 
to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit, 
to another faith . . . , to another the gift of healing 
. . . , to another working of miracles," etc. In all of 
these gifts w^hich are bestowed upon any individual child 
of God, they are given to him for the profit of all. 
They are not, therefore, to be selfishly used, for our 
divine Partner is looking unto us to employ our time and 
talents in ways that shall advance His cause and redound 
to His glory. 

If time permitted, we could enumerate some of the 
wonderful ways in which the Holy Spirit, our divine 
helper, comes to our assistance. Let me just suggest, for 
further meditation, a few of these : For one thing. He 
opens the w'ay for personal evangelism — for successful 
soul-winning work as illustrated by His guidance of 
Philip in the saving of the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts 8). 
Again the Spirit answers believing prayer in tim.es of 
great discouragement and stress, as illustrated by Peter's 
deliverance from the prison when the church prayed. 
And again He gives the power necessary for all success- 
ful service, for Christ promises, ''Ye shall receive power 
after that the Holy Spirit is come upon you" (Acts i :8). 
What marvelous and mighty power they had! Through 
this power, three thousand w^ere converted upon the day 
of Pentecost alone, and despite persecution even unto 
death itself, the young church went forward victoriously 
by leaps and bounds, because they were imbued with 
power from on high, — even the power of the blessed Holy 
Spirit of the living God! 



GOSPEL OF THE HOLY SPIRIT 213 

THE ONLY CONDITION 

Now, there is only one condition laid down in the 
Word of God for all of this, and that is obedience. We 
are enjoined, ''Grieve not the Holy Spirit." If our in- 
dividual life or church life is empty and blank it is only 
because we refuse to obey God and to receive the fullness 
of the Holy Spirit's power, as our infalHble Guide, our 
heavenly Comforter, and our divine Helper. We may 
illustrate this by thinking of an empty, closed-up house. 
There it stands, dark, moldy, and full of foul air. How 
can we get the house bright and wholesome and sweet? 
Why, only by opening it up that the light and the air 
may come in. If you go into one of the rooms and open 
the door and throw back the shutter and roll up the 
shade, instantly the room will be flooded with light, and 
the sweet fresh air will come rushing in to drive the foul 
air out. If you stop there, that one room will be bright, 
but all the rest of the house will be dark and foul, but if 
you go throughout the house and open every window and 
every door, soon the entire house wdll be full of light. 
The fresh sweet air will be every^where; the mold will 
dry up and disappear, and it will become a place of 
beauty and comfort and cheer. 

Oh, may we throw open the portals of our souls that 
the blessed Holy Spirit may come in and possess us fully 
— not one little corner, or one little room of our hearts, 
while we reserve the remainder selfishly for our worldly 
pleasures and our own am.bitions, but let us open every 
door and every window, that we may become, indeed and 
in truth, the Tem.ple of the Holy Spirit, filled with the 
light and the love and the power of heaven, for service 
and for sanctification ! 



CHAPTER XVI 

ARE THE NEW HEAVENS AND THE NEW 
EARTH NEAR AT HAND? 



Scripture Lesson : "There shall come in the last days scolders, 
walking after their own lusts, and saying. Where is the prci-ise 
of His coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue 
as they were from the beginning of the creation. For this they 
willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens 
were of old. and the earth standing out of the water, and in the 
water: whereby the world that then was, being overflowed vrith 
water, perished : but the heavens and the earth which are now. by 
the samie word are kept in store, reserved unto fere against the 
day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. 

But, beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day is 
with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand year? as cne 
day. The Lord is not slack concerning His prom^ise. as snr.e n-en 
count slackness; but is longsuftering to us-ward, nc: v.-il'.ir.g :::a: 
any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, Fu: the 
day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the v.r.ich the 
heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the eleme::ts sh.all 
melt with ferv^ent heat; the earth also, and the works that are 
therein, shall be burned up. 

Seeing then that all these things shall be dissolved, v/hat manner 
of persons ought ye to be in all holy conversaticn a:::, ccahness; 
looking for and hasting unto the coming of the day of God, vrherein 
the heavens, being on hre. shall be dissolved, and the elements shall 
melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless we, according to his promise, 
look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteous- 
ness. Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, be 
diligent that ye may be found of Him in peace, without spot, and 
blameless." (ii Peter, 3:3-14.) 

Text : ''Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new 
heavens and a new earth, v/herein dvrelleth righteousness.*' (11 Peter 
3:13.) "And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first 
heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more 
sea." (Rev. 21 :i.) 

We are all interested in the coming time. The destiny 
of the planet on which we live is a fascinating theme to 

214 



Ii 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 215 

the thoughtful mind. The question of the future is the 
most important question that the individual and the race 
have to face. The past is gone and we cannot alter it; 
the present we know, and within the limitations of the 
flesh we can improve it; but what the future holds for 
us is at last the greatest question of all. 

Now we will never have any true understanding of 
our earth, nor will we ever comprehend the meaning of 
our individual and racial destiny, until we grasp the 
significance of God's Eden plan for this world. 

God's original plan was a perfect world dowered with 
happiness and blessed with peace. God's plan was a 
Garden of joy and not a slaughterhouse of woe. It is 
written in Genesis of the new creation, and five times 
repeated in one chapter, that ''God saw what He had 
made that it was good," and then it is summarized at the 
close of the chapter, that ''God saw everything that He 
had made and behold it was very good." (Gen. i :3i.) 
It was not only good, note you, but "very good," in the 
planning and purpose of God; and there was a period 
in which these conditions of sinlessness, and peace, and 
joy continued. Some imagine that Eden was ruined as 
soon as it Vv^as created, but this is a mistake. The ac- 
count in Genesis is a highly condensed account, and 
doubtless life went forward for quite a season there in 
innocence and joy. We do not know just how life would 
have developed on this planet if these loving plans of 
God had not been disturbed. All, of course, would have 
been very different from what we now know, both in 
the realm of morals and even in the cosmos itself. The 
nearest conception we can get of it, perhaps, is seen in 
the innocence and carefree joy of childhood. But an 
entirely different physical and moral order from that 
which we now have is not at all an unreasonable concep- 
tion. The great truth that we need to lay hold of, 



2i6 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

however, and which will clarify our thinking in many 
other connections, is that the divine plan was a perfect 
and sinless world, in which men should w^alk and talk with 
God — enjoying the fullness of fellowship with Heaven. 

But sin entered and wrecked this plan of God, so far 
as man was concerned. In order to make us men, instead 
of mere automatic machines driven by sheer necessity, 
God had to make us free; and this gift of freedom, 
this inestimable boon of self-determination, this right 
which the good God gave us to choose for ourselves, 
carried with it the possibility of wrong choice, of re- 
bellion against the Creator. 

It is not necessary now to go into any consideration 
of just how sin entered the new creation. The tragic 
fact that it did enter is proved, not only by the past 
history, but by the present condition of the human race. 
The Bible teaching is that the devil tempted and misled 
God's first children, and thus caused them and all their 
descendants to sin. And this fall of man affected even 
the material world. *^The whole creation groaneth and 
travaileth in pain together until now," and ''the earnest 
expectation of the creation waiteth for the manifestation 
of the sons of God.'' (Romans 8:22 and 19.) 

The final restitution of the human race and its per- 
petuation in a purified and perfected world is necessary, 
therefore, if God is really to win completely in the age- 
long contest between Himself and the devil. Unless the 
earth is to be restored and God's Eden plan is finally 
to be victorious, then He has only partly succeeded in 
His wise and loving efforts toward redemption. The 
salvation even of large numbers of individuals out of 
the race is not the redemption of the race, but only the 
gathering up of a few broken fragments. 



i 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 217 

THE MATERIAL UNIVERSE NOT TO' BE DESTROYED 

There is no ground, either, for the widespread belief 
that the material universe is finally to be wiped out. All 
that we really know about the facts of life and the con- 
ditions of the world in which we live, points not to the 
destruction, but to the perpetuation of the world, although 
in a transformed state. Science teaches the conservation 
of energy and the indestructibility of matter. It also 
teaches a constant progress upward, even through occa- 
sional and temporary retrogression. This progress which 
we observe in nature, and which has been recorded by 
science, is not a continuous and uninterrupted process. 
It is not an ascending spiral. On the other hand, it is 
marked by a series of great catastrophes, each one ending 
an era and marking the beginning of a new era. 

We are all familiar with the geological epochs, or 
**eras,'' and it is unnecessary here to review them, further 
than to point out that each one marked a distinctive 
stage in the development of the material world, and also 
in the unfolding of animal and vegetable life. In one 
era we find, for example, gigantic animals, mighty beasts 
and birds, beside which the animals of to-day are pyg- 
mies. The earth and air and sea were alive with these 
tremendous monsters. Then came a time when they were 
swept away by the catastrophic changes in earth and sea 
and air. New climatic conditions were established and 
new forms of animal and vegetable life came into being 
in the new era, and so on and on through the several great 
periods of development which have marked the history 
of our earth. 

I was engaged some time ago with my boys in con- 
structing a stone wall at a little summer place in the 
country. We had to dig a number of very heavy stones 



21 8 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

out of the ground and roll them into position. One of 
the boys asked me one morning why the stones were 
prevailingly round instead of square-cornered or sharp- 
edged, and I explained to them that, in a former age, 
all of this part of the world, which is now so fair and 
beautiful, was covered over with a sheet of ice. I told 
them how climatic changes came about that melted the 
ice, and how gigantic glaciers went grinding their way 
down grade toward the sea or the deep valleys of the 
mountains, and that the mighty masses of ice rolled the 
stones, large and small, beneath them and wore off their 
corners and polished down their edges until they became, 
some of them, as round as marbles. 

So it is that the w^orld has passed through a series 
of stages of development. Geologists call them eras; 
theologians possibly would call them dispensations; but 
the main fact stands that there has been a series of such 
periods, each marked by tremendous changes that seem 
to have shaken the very foundations of the earth itself. 

It is not irrational, therefore, to anticipate yet another 
such change — a change that will bring the world up to 
a much higher physical, moral and spiritual plane, than 
it now knows; a change that will be marked by the 
refining and improvement even of the material universe 
in ways that are beyond the power of our poor imagina- 
tions even to picture in this present stage of existence. 

THE BIBLE DOES NOT TEACH DESTRUCTION 

Nor is there anything in the Bible antagonistic to this 
idea. The Bible does not teach the utter destruction of 
the world, as some have thought. Such terms as, *^the 
end of the world,'' and the descriptions we have, like 
that in Second Peter 3:10, of the earth being swept 
by fire and of there being *'no more sea," signify not a | 
cessation of existence, but rather a change to higher ■ 



J 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 219 

forms. The passage in Second Peter 3:1012 in the 
authorized version reads as follows : 

^*But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the 
night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a 
great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent 
heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall 
be burned up. Seeing then that all these things shall be 
dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all 
holy conversation and godliness, looking for and hasting 
unto the coming of the day of God, wherein the heavens 
being on fire shall be dissolved, and the elements shall 
melt with fervent heat?'' 

In the tenth verse, instead of **burned up" the most 
ancient manuscripts read ''discovered." By these great 
changes, then, the true earth, lying dormant, as it were, 
in the present earth, will be discovered. Peter evidently 
clearly understood all of this, for he goes on to say that 
our conversation ought to be full of holiness and Godli-* 
ness, because we ''look for new heavens and a new earth 
wherein dwelleth righteousness." 

The end of the world, as used in the Bible, then, means 
the end of this present old world with its sins and suffer- 
ing. One such destruction of the earth has already oc- 
curred. Peter, speaking of the earth and heavens of 
Noah's time, says, "The world that then was, being over- 
flov/ed with water, perished." (11 Peter 3:5-6.) He 
meant, of course, that the condition of things that then 
existed and the people who then lived upon the planet 
perished, but the earth, in a new form, continued and the 
race was perpetuated. 

Some of the Greek words employed in these Scripture 
passages referring to the destruction of the last times, 
have the idea of "passing through from one thing to 
another," as a man passing through a bath, or a ship 



220 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

through the sea. The man goes into the bath dirty, but 
when he has passed through he is clean : and the ship 
passes through the sea from one place to another. So 
the world is to pass through changes from its present 
dirty condition into a new clean, moral condition. The 
main idea of these passages, therefore, is transition, 
not extinction. 

THE SACREDXESS OF OUR EARTH 

There is yet another consideration which should weigh 
with us in favor of the proposition that this earth is 
not to be wiped out,, but that it is simply to be trans- 
formed into a yet higher stage of existence. 

From God's side, as devout spirits have pointed out, 
there is a peculiar consecration upon this planet. It is 
not only the sea of the tragic story of humanity: it is 
not only the arena in which the tremendous drama of 
history has been performed, — a drama that has been 
marked by the tears and the strife and the suffering and 
the sin, and also by the glorious aspirations and the fine 
heroisms of the human race, but it is also the scene of the 
mighty struggle of God and man against the devil and 
his hosts of wickedness. Just as the smaUest jewel is 
often the most precious: just as little Belgium, in a sen^e, 
was the center of the \\^orld War, and just as insigniii- 
cant Httle Switzerland becomes now the seat of the League 
of Nations, so out of all the orbs of heaven, out of all 
the mighty planets that roll in splendor in yonder firma- 
ment, God selected this little world of ours as the scene 
of these tremendous events. 

The soil of this earth has been saturated by the sweat 
and the tears and the blood of the Son of God. His eyes 
looked upon its beauties, His body was nourished by its 
bounty, His lungs breathed its air, upon one of its rocky 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 221 

hills, as humanity's Saviour, He hung in bloody agony 
upon a cross, and into its sympathetic bosom, His broken 
and lifeless form was laid. Here, too, in one the sweet 
gardens of earth were the scenes that witnessed the vic- 
tory over death and the grave by our Redeemer. And 
here it is, also, according to the blessed promises of 
the Word, that this crucified, risen and ascended Saviour 
is to come again in divine power and heavenly glory. 
It is revolting, therefore, to think that a planet so con- 
secrated by these sublime events and so hallowed by these 
sacred associations should be handed over to oblivion, and 
that it should be wiped out as though it had never been. 

man's home 

Not only should these considerations weigh, but there 
is yet another thought. It is that this world is our home, 
and we naturally feel for it, therefore, the affection that 
centers in a home. 

I was invited, a short time ago, to return to the old 
college town in the South where I had lived as a boy. 
I went back, no longer to romp those streets as a care- 
free, bare-limbed lad, but now to deliver the baccalaureate 
sermon before the student bodies of the two colleges. 

There was one spot above all others in that little city 
that held an interest and charm for me. It was the old 
home, — a plain, old-fashioned southern house, with its 
high columns, with its great magnolia tree in the front 
yard, and the giant oaks that sheltered its hospitable 
roof from the heat of southern suns. 

Again and again, during my stay, I was drawn back 
to that spot. I could not go uptown without making 
a detour and walking by the old place ; and one evening, 
out for a stroll all alone, I found myself gravitating 
again to the old home. There it was, flooded with moon- 



222 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

light, with its green grasses and its stately trees, and the 
sweet rose garden that my mother had tended, still filled 
with beautiful blossoms, especially the lovely tea-roses 
of which she had been so fond. There were those rose 
bushes still bravely blooming on, though thirty years had 
winged their way into eternity, since last I had seen 
them, and though the lips that had exclaimed in rapture 
at their heavenly charms were silent, and the mother's 
hand that had tended them had long since crumbled into 
dust. 

And so I stood across the street, quietly looking at the 
old place. It was all so real again that it seemed but 
yesterday that I was a boy, going along those streets ofif 
to school or on my joyful way back to my father's roof- 
tree. So real was it all and so precious in its sweet sug- 
gestions and memories that if the front door had opened 
and father had stepped out, and then if mother had come 
with her happy smile and slipped her arm through his, 
for a swing as in the other days, up and down the long 
front porch, I would scarcely have been surprised. 

And though strangers are in the old place now, it was 
some satisfaction to find the impulses of human fellow- 
ship and friendliness still abiding there. For when I 
went by one day and told the kind lady who I was, and 
that I wondered if I might come in, she was all gracious- 
ness and hospitality. With a woman's quick intuition 
she sensed the situation, and not only ushered me in, but 
all over the house — through the wide hall, into the quaint 
old-fashioned parlor, and across into my parent's bed- 
room, with its wide-mouth fireplace, around which the 
family prayers were always said; and up to father's 
library room, and back into my own little bedroom, close 
up under the roof. 

Yes, the kind lady understood. For she knew that to 
me it was still ''Home." Though all my interests are 



I: 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 223 

now elsewhere, that old house, and the few acres of 
ground around it, are precious and dear to my heart ; and 
because of the associations of the past, it was a joy to 
come back and view those familiar scenes once more. 



THE BEAUTY OF THE WORLD 

And so this old earth of ours is our home — carpeted 
with the greenest grasses and the never-resting sea, 
walled in by towering mountains, domed by heaven's eter- 
nal blue, and lighted by flaming sun and silvery moon 
and millions of jewel stars that flash in the diadem of 
the night! 

Much more than we often stop to realize do these 
attractions of the old home mean to us. As we look 
upon the soft sweetness of the springtime, and the ardent 
beauty of the summer, and the pensive charms of autumn, 
marching in glorious colors and regal pomp to the grave, 
and even as we see the white majesty and the austere 
grandeur of winter, in all its kingly charms, the world's 
message of beauty finds its echo in our hearts. As we 
look out upon the smiling fields, garlanded v/ith their 
gorgeous flowers, as we gaze with rapt hearts upon the 
mystery of the ocean, and see its every wave edged with 
lacy foam, or hear its great billows breaking in thunder 
upon the shore; as we see majestic mountains, with their 
diadems of eternal snow sparkling against the purple 
of a summer sky; as we walk in the cathedral silence of 
giant forests, or look upon the glories of sunsets, or the 
soft radiance of the dawn, or m.oonlight playing upon 
dancing waters, or as we see the rainbow hung upon the 
dark bosom of the storm — as we see all this bright gar- 
ment of Nature, so familiar to every one and so lovely 
in its charms, who does not wish that, freed from the 



224 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

blight and burden of sin, we might continue to know it, 
to love it, and to enjoy it forever? 

And so we shall, only it will be infinitely higher and 
more glorious than we have known it or ever dared to 
dream. The Bible says, ''Eye hath not seen, nor ear 
heard, nor has it entered into the heart of man to under- 
stand the things that God is preparing for them that love 
him/' The old garment now upon nature is rare and 
beautiful, and even the present world, despite its suffering 
and sin, is full of rejoicing and glory. How wonderful, 
then, *'the new heavens and the new earth'' ! God is 
preparing His greatest masterpiece to come hereafter; 
and think what the masterpiece of God will be ! We look 
upon the achievements of Michael Angelo and the can- 
vases of Raphael with awe and wonder, but what will 
it mean when God paints His final masterpiece! When 
against the background of infinite blue skies, set with 
flaming suns, the hand of Omnipotent Love shall per- 
fect in superlative glory man's final home! 

A SINLESS HUMAN RACE 

And upon this new earth, purified of all that is ugly 
and harmful, there will be a new race of men, clothed in 
holiness and walking in harmony with the will of God. 
For it is to be the new earth, ''wherein dwelleth right- 
eousness." Scripture teaches clearly that, in the fullness 
of God's time, the devil, the author of all evil, is to be 
completely defeated and cast out. In the revelation of 
the judgment time and the things which are to follow, 
God led John to say: 

*'And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having 
the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his 
hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 225 

which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand 
years, and cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut 
him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive 
the nations no more, till the thousand years should be 
fulfilled: and after that he loosed a little season/' (Rev. 
20:1-3.) 

Then, following this loosing for a little season, the 
devil is finally and forever disposed of : 

''And the devil that deceived them was cast into the 
lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false 
prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for 
ever and ever." (Rev. 20:10.) 

And with this elimination of the devil from the affairs 
of earth, all the sin and suffering and sorrow which he 
caused will disappear. Every plague spot of sin and 
infamy will be blotted out; all the marshes and bogs of 
crime, all the gambling dens and drinking hells, and 
brothels, and haunts of shame, all the loathsome pest 
holes of hideous disease done away forever. 

All the depraved cabinets and the vainglorious courts, 
and the self-seeking legislatures of the world, adjourned. 
All rotten rulers and corrupt public officials, who use 
their offices for private gain through public plunder 
and to serve the advancement of their own political for- 
tunes, banished in utter disgrace from before the chil- 
dren of men. All the cannon melted into church bells 
and the swords beaten into reaping hooks. All the empti- 
ness and vanity which now characterize social life ex- 
ploded and true brotherhood and human sympathy smil- 
ing in their stead. Every impure picture and every line 
of lust on every printed page, and every lecherous play- 



226 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

house and every lie of yellow journalism cast out 
forever. 

All the cheats and swindlers and bogus goods, and 
frauds, and dishonest advertising and wooden nutmegs 
and half cotton "wool'' and watered milk and pasteboard 
'leather,'' and excelsior breakfast foods and wild-cat 
stocks and inflated securities, sent into eternal limbo. All 
the padded forms and painted cheeks and blondined hair 
and false teeth and bustles and ''rats" and paste pearls 
and glass diamonds seen no more! Yes, all the awful 
lies that we now have to read and see, and wear, and even 
eat, banished — and truth, in its simplicity and beauty 
established forever. 

All the selfish and infamous cliques and combinations 
and rings^ — political rings, and whiskey rings, and vice 
rings, and society rings, and railroad rings, and mer- 
cantile rings, and bankers' rings, and labor rings, and 
building-contractor rings, and walking-delegate rings, 
and dancing masters rings, and bolshevistic rings, — yes, 
and preacher rings — and a thousand other rings — broken 
up, and in their place, fraternity, love and sweet fellow- 
ship established! 

Every jail emptied out, every penitentiary in the hands 
of a receiver, every law court closed, every judge given 
a permanent vacation, all the forces that have to drive 
and restrain and coerce the sons of men, and all those 
who work iniquity in any form, putting through rotten 
laws, crippling honest industry, corrupting the press, ex- 
ploiting the poor, — whatsoever maketh iniquity or work- 
eth a lie — ended by the power of the Almighty, and a 
clean, honest, healthy, pure-minded, straight-limbed, red- 
blooded, home-loving, woman-honoring, God-fearing 
race of men walking in the midst of a redeemed creation, 
lighted with beauty and blessed by the smile of an 
approving God! 



J 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 227 

THE PERFECT FLOWER OF HUMANITY 

All that is moves to some climax of self-expression. 
We see a root in the mud at the bottom of a lake, but 
there is no meaning in that alone. Then from that root 
we see a stem reaching up through the darkness of the 
water and groping toward the light, but there is no mean- 
ing in that alone. Then we see a leaf spread upon the 
bosom of the lake, but there is no meaning in that alone. 
But pass that spot another day, and you will fxnd there 
one of heaven's jewels, as lovely as an angel's dream. 
There you will find a water-lily, with leaf of snow and 
heart of gold, wooed by the winds and kissed by the 
waves, and exhaling its sweet perfume to the breeze. 
Then the meaning of root and stem and leaf becomes 
plain. All of these things that went before were but 
leading up to this manifestation of beauty, — the crown- 
ing miracle of higher life! 

Surely, our poor old humanity is moving to some bet- 
ter goal than we have yet attained! Surely, in God'o 
good time and in His own great way, after all the blood 
and the rapine and the lust, righteousness and peace are 
to spread their wings above the children of men I Surely, 
our race, with all its struggles and shame over, is to 
flower out at last in beauty and blessedness, in the time 
of that 

* Tar-off divine event 
Toward which the whole creation moves T' 

WHEX WILL THESE THINGS BE? 

But you ask me, as we face this tremendous truth, 
when will these things come to pass? And I answer, 
directly and explicitly. "'When Jesus Christ comes back 



228 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

again.'' The Scripture tells us that He will come, and 
that in that ''day of the Lord." these things will come to 
be. The Scriptiu'e warns ns, too, that one of the signs 
that the great and awful time when these things shall 
come to pass is near at hand, is the denial of this very 
fact of Christ's return. The Scripture says here: 

^Tvnowing this first, that there shall come in the last 
days scoffers, walking after their own lusts : and saying, 
Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers 
fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the be- 
ginning of the creation.'' 

Sneering skepticism concerning the tremendous truth 
of the return of Christ is one of the clear signs recorded 
in the Bible of the near approach of the Judgment Day 
— ''the day of the Lord" — when the mighty fires of divine 
wrath shall burn up the wickedness of the world, when 
the devil shall be cast out, and the reign of righteousness 
shall be at hand. 

In the light of these tremendous truths, we turn to 
ask the searching question of this great Scripture lesson 
upon which we are meditating, "Seeing, then, that all 
these things shall be dissolved, what maimer of persons 
ought ye to be in all holy living and Godliness?" 

Surely the man who has such truths as those contained 
in this mighty plan of God for the coming time set be- 
fore him, and yet goes on living for the present only, and 
denying the claims of Godliness, and walking in the 
selfish impulses of the unregenerate heart, and following 
the lusts of the flesh, thereby proclaims himself to belong 
to that class of fools who, according to the Scripture, 
say in their hearts that there is no God! 

Surely no mind that is lionest with itself, and that 
has intelligence enougli to grasp the significance of thes*? 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 229 

great truths, can possibly rest satisfied until it obeys God 
and makes preparation, not only to escape the fiery wrath 
of divine retribution in that awful judgment time, but 
by that makes also preparation to share the unending 
blessedness and joy of those who are redeemed and who 
shall reign with Christ in the new heavens and the new 
earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. 

WHY CHRIST CAME 

Because of the awful reality of coming judgment, and 
because of the infinite possibilities of the human race, the 
Son of God came down from Heaven to earth, and took 
upon Him the form of a servant and became obedient 
unto death, even the death of the cross, that He might 
redeem us forevermore. 

Some of you, perhaps, have heard that beautiful story 
which Mrs. E. M. Whittemore tells about the redemption 
of Delia, the poor wayward girl in the slums of New 
York, who was known as ''The Bluebird of Mulberry 
Bend." Mrs. Whittemore, through the sympathy of her 
great heart, was led to establish ''The Door of Hope'' 
for fallen girls in New York. For over a generation 
now she has stretched out the hand of helpfulness to all 
who could be reached, mothering them w^ith a great 
heart's devotion, and literally loving many of them back 
to purity and God. 

One night, when starting out with her faithful group 
of companions, going down into the awful slums of New 
York City, she was moved to take from the vase a beau- 
tiful red rose, thinking that it might be used to help some 
poor girl. And so it was, for there upon the streets they 
found this wretched child, — one of those girls who fall 
so low that they drift into the awful haunts of shame, 
dancing in drunken revelry in the dives along the river's 



230 THE GARDENS OF LIFE ^ 

front, down in foul basements, literally holes in the 
ground where the rising tide often enters to drive them 
forth. And there they found this girl, all battered and 
bruised from a beating that she had received from 
the hands of a brutal man. Her form was wrecked by 
drunkenness and wasted by disease, and her once fair 
face was marred by the marks of sin. Very harshly she 
replied to Mrs. Whittemore's first w^ords to her. But 
something in the motherly face and the gentleness of the 
reply softened her blasphemies, and Mrs. Whittemore v 
placed in her hands the royal blossom which she had | 
brought — the beautiful red rose. | 

The girl went away, still cursing, but she carried 
the rose in her hand. She carried the rose to her dingy 
room, and instead of stamiping it upon the floor, as she 
first intended doing, she put it in a cup, and it began to 
speak a message to her heart. The thought came to her 
that once she was as beautiful and as innocent as the 
flower, and thus she was brought to a sense of need. 

Mrs. Whittemore and her workers reached her later, 
and she found Christ as her Saviour. She W'as trans- 
formed into a rare saint of God, a soul-winner of great 
power, and a teacher of the Bible who was used to the 
time of her death to reach many other fallen girls. 

I have seen the two pictures of that dear child, the 
one taken at the time when she was first found, when 
her face was broken and bruised and her hair disheveled, | 
and the wildness of sin — the very fires of hell — already 
in her eyes, and the other as she stood with the open 
Word of God in her hand, clothed and in her right mind, 
with her face beautified beyond its natural charms by a 
rare spiritual atmosphere that seemed literally to trans- 
figure it. 

Human interest and love, oh, my friends, accomplished , 
that, by going down, in the spirit of sacrifice, to the help 



NEW HEAVENS AND EARTH NEAR? 231 

of the fallen. So God, in Christ Jesus, came down from 
heaven to earth to redeem us and prepare us for the 
glory of the new heavens and the new earth wherein 
dwelleth righteousness. 

And God now is trying to pin upon our hearts, each 
one of us, the red rose of His love in Christ Jesus our 
Lord. Christ is God's great Christmas gift to men. He 
is the ''unspeakable gift," because with Him all bless- 
ings go. Through the transforming power of His grace, 
we will come into salvation, and we will be prepared 
to have our share in the blessedness of that happy time, 
when all the earth shall bow the knee to Jesus Christ, 
when righteousness shall reign, and the earth shall be 
full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover 
the sea! 

HEAVEN NEAR TO EARTH 

And crowning it all, as a final thought, we have the 
teaching of the Word of God, that there will be, in that 
happy time, a much closer and more intimate relationship 
than at present between earth and heaven. In the be- 
ginning God not only put man in the garden, but there 
was a closeness of fellowship between the Creator and 
His creatures. Whatever else it may mean, certainly 
the teaching in Genesis that Adam, walked and talked 
w^ith God, means that God's plan is for freedom of fel- 
lowship between heaven and earth. And the Scripture 
is very clear in teaching that there will finally be a 
renewal of commerce between these two centers of God's 
activities, when the New Jerusalem descends out of 
heaven and bends near to the earth. 

Not only does the book of Genesis reveal to us the 
possibility of this intimacy between heaven and earth, but 
the Psalmist caught some faint glimpse of the glory 



232 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

that is to be when, in describing the blessedness of the 
coming salvation, he exclaimed: 

''Mercy and truth are met together, righteousness and 
peace have kissed each other. Truth shall spring out of 
the earth; and righteousness shall look down from 
heaven." (Psalm 85:10, 11.) 

And John beheld, in prophetic panorama, some of the 
wonders of that glad day, and he exclaimed: 

''And I saw a new heaven and a new earth ; for the first 
heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there 
was no more sea. And I, John, saw the holy city, new 
Jerusalem, coming down from God out of Heaven, pre- 
pared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard 
a great voice out of heaven saying. Behold, the tabernacle 
of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they 
shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, 
and be their God, for the former things are passed away." 

Thus, oh, friends, in the fullness of the times, it shall 
come to pass that God's Eden plan will be victorious. 
All of man's sins and sorrows will be over, and the arch 
enemy, who wrecked the first Eden, will be defeated. 
Every trace of his malign activity will disappear, and 
there will be, in glorious reality, a redeemed race and a 
purified earth — an earth which knows no longer the blight 
of disease, or the wasting of pestilence or the fury of 
storms; an earth whose "sod shall never be cut by 
graves, whose soil is never moistened with tears or satu- 
rated with human blood," but which shall know only the 
sweetness of the smile of the Lord, as from end to end 
and center to circumference it is clothed at last with the 
beauty and blessedness of Paradise Restored! 



I 



CHAPTER XVII 

WILL WE KNOW OUR LOVED ONES IN 
HEAVEN? 

Text: "Wherefore comfort one another with these words/' (i 
Thess. 4:18.) 

Will we know our loved ones in heaven? Every 
heart thrills with interest at that question. Is death a 
night of oblivion, unlighted by a single star, or is it the 
dawning of an eternal morning of reunion, where w^e 
will meet and greet again t^ie loved and the lost who have 
gone on before? 

"When the holy angels meet us, 

And we go to join their band, 
Shall we know the friends that greet us 

In that glorious spirit land? 
Shall we see the same eyes shining 

On us as in days of yore? 
Shall we feel the dear arms twining 

Fondly 'round us as before? 

"When we hear the music ringing 
In the bright celestial dome. 
When the angels' voices singing 
Gladly bid us welcome home, 
To the land of ancient story. 

Where the spirits know no care, 
In that land of light and glory. 
Shall we know each other there?'' 
233 



234 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

I rejoice, my friends, that I can bring you to-night 
the testimony of an unshaken faith that we will literally 
know our loved ones over there. This is the shadow 
world, and the glorious reality is beyond the grave. I 
thank God that Christians do not need to chisel on their 
tombs the skull and cross bones. We can put there 
rather the red rose and the white lily — sweet emblems 
of Christ's atoning blood and the glory of His resurrec- 
tion. And I have often thought that it would be better 
for us, instead of the somber hues of mourning that we 
assume if the Christian would put on a simple bow of 
white, as a memorial to the dead. I have ever felt that 
it would be better to put a golden border about our letter- 
paper when some dear one has fallen asleep in Jesus, and 
to leave the black border for those who are without hope 
and without God in the world. 

You will recall in that lovely old-fashioned classic, 
'Taul and Virginia," the account of the burial of Vir- 
ginia. You recall how she had been away to Europe, 
from her island home in the tropics, leaving her broken- 
hearted lover, Paul, behind her. Then the story tells 
of her return and his rapturous joy at the thought of 
seeing her again, and having her forever. But then 
came the terrible shipwreck, when the vessel was dashed 
to pieces before his very eyes, as he stood on the shore, 
and she was lost, and her beautiful body was later cast 
up on the sands. You remember then, in the account of 
her burial, how the simple hearted natives of the island, 
where she had lived all her life, to show their devotion 
to her and their gratitude for the many deeds of charity 
which she had done for them, brought cages filled with 
song-birds, and at the grave side, they opened the cages 
and let the birds fly out, singing as they mounted up on 
eager wings — fit symbols of the gladness and liberty of 
a redeemed soul. 



WILL WE KNOW OUR LOVED ONES? 235 

So, in our thoughts together upon this great theme, 
I would go with you, my dear friends, to the sepulchers 
of your departed dead, and I w^ould take with me the 
blessed truth of God, and I would open its leaves and 
let fly its numberless consolations that they may fill your 
hearts with comfort and peace. Yes, we will know our 
loved ones in heaven ! 

From the earliest times men have longed for immor- 
tality, have dreamed over it, and have intuitively believed 
in it. The faiths and traditions of other ages of far- 
distant climes, while having no conclusive force in shap- 
ing our beliefs, must, nevertheless, ever retain a species 
of moral influence in the consideration of such questions 
as this, for they carry with them something of the author- 
ity of precedent. The weight of this authority is in- 
creased by the clearness of these beliefs and their wide 
diffusion historically and geographically. Granted this 
to be true, then we may see that the idea of another life 
comes to us with weighty presuppositions in its favor, 
for it might almost be said that every age and every 
tribe of earth have believed in some form of survival 
after death. The unaided mind of man has groped 
blindly but persistently toward this mighty truth. The 
burial rites of primitive man embalming by the Egyp- 
tians, the great care taken of the dead by the Chaldeans, 
ancestor worship among the Chinese, where the departed 
spirits are supposed to coalesce and form a sort of col- 
lective soul guarding the household, metempsychosis and 
transmigration of souls believed in by the peoples of 
India, all indicate faith in an unseen world among these 
several branches of the human race. 

Addison has Cato saying, in his famous soliloquy: 

"It must be so — Plato, thou reason'st well ! 
Else, whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire, 



236 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

This longing after immortality? 

Or whence this secret dread and inward horror 

Of falling into naught? Why shrinks the soul 

Back on herself, and startles at destruction? 

'Tis the Divinity that stirs within us ; 

'Tis Heaven itself that points out an Hereafter, 

And intimates Eternity to man. 

Eternity! — thou pleasing, dreadful thought! 

Through what variety of untried being. 

Through what new scenes and changes must we pass t 

The wide, th' unbounded prospect lies before me; 

But shadows, clouds and darkness rest upon it." 

Wordsworth, in his ' 'Intimations of Immortality/' ex- 
pressed the same great truth when he said : 

''Our noisy years seem moments in the 

Being of the eternal silence: truths 
That wake to perish never — 

Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavor 
Nor man nor boy, 
Nor all that is at enmity with joy, 

Can utterly abolish or destroy! 
Here in a season of calm weather, 

Though inland far we be. 
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea 

Which brought us hither — - 
Can in a moment travel thither. 

And see the children sport upon the shore. 
And hear the mighty waters rolling ever more/* 

These aspirations of the human heart and these in- 
tuitions are in themselves proofs and prophecies of a 
future state and heavenly recognition. The wild bird of 
our northern climate, surrounded by the ice and snow of 
Canada, dreams of comrades who have gone before to 
green grasses and warm waters within the torrid zone. 



WILL WE KNOW OUR LOVED ONES? 237 

Dreaming thus, its unerring instinct turns it toward the 
south, and flying in that direction it rejoins the friends 
of former times and bathes its plumage in all the sunny 
pleasures foretold to its instincts and desires. Must it 
not be that the deeper longings of the human heart for 
a realization of its nobler and higher possibilities and for 
reunion with loved ones gone before, are destined to a 
like reahzation? One has beautifully asked that, if this 
be not so, why it is that the rainbow comes over us with 
a beauty that is not of earth and then passes off and 
leaves us to muse upon its favored loveliness ? Why it is 
that the stars that hold their festival around the midnight 
throne are set above the grasp of our limited faculties, 
forever mocking us with their unapproachable glory? 
Why it is that bright forms of human beauty — the 
friends that we love and partly know — are presented to 
our vision and then taken from us, leaving the thousand 
streams of our affections to flow back in Alpine torrents 
upon the heart? Must there not be a time w^hen the 
eternal aspirations which thus are kindled shall be satis- 
fied? Must there not be a realm w^here the rainbow 
never fades, where the stars will bedspread before us like 
islands that slumber on the ocean, and where the loved 
ones who have journeyed here for a season by our sides 
will join us again to stay in our presence forever? 

Every good thing in this world is in itself a prophecy, 
a type, of something better and more perfect to come. 
Every garden of earth is a reminder of the bloom and 
beauty of paradise. Every grandly rolling river is a type 
of that stream which ''makes glad the city of God." 
Every snow crowned peak, glittering in the sunlight, is 
emblematic of the glory-crowned summits of the delect- 
able mountains, and every high soul whom we touch in 
this world, and who inspires us by the nobility of his 
character and the splendor of his aspirations, is but a 



238 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

prophecy of the possibiHties of fellowship forever with 
the spirits of just men made perfect. 



REASON DECLARES FOR HEAVENLY RECOGNITION 

Another reason for believing in a future life is the fact 
of the conservation of matter and force. We can appeal 
therefore to the law of indestructibility which pervades 
all matter and which governs all the manifestations of 
life and force in any form, and come to the conclusion 
that conscious force, or consciousness, or personality can- 
not perish. This great law of conservation watches over 
and preserves the minutest material atom with unswerving 
constancy. It presides over the transmutation of energy 
in every form. A pebble dropped into the midst of the 
ocean will cause a ripple of energy that crosses the entire 
ocean, transmits itself to the distant shore and, according 
to science, moves on among the atoms of matter forever. 
Shall the soul, then — with its marvelous ethical energy 
and its moral powers — shall the soul, which is the crown 
of the universe, be destroyed? The poet Young has 
well asked : 

^^Can it be? 
Matter immortal and shall spirit die? 
Above the nobler, shall the less noble rise? 
Shall man alone, from whom all else revives, 
No resurrection know? Shall man alone. 
Imperial man! be sown in barren ground. 
Less privileged than the grain, on which he feeds?'' 

It would seem that, with the wonders of radium, wire- 
less telegraphy and the Roentgen ray, whose phenomena 
are contrary to many of our former canons of science 
and philosophy, we ought by now to have a teachable 
humility in regard to the unseen world. 



WILL WE KNOW OUR LOVED ONES? 239 

Since personality is preserved beyond the grave, recog- 
nition must logically follow, for we know each other 
here through distinguishing traits of our personalities. 
If every one of us was physically exactly like every one 
else, the wife would still know her husband, and the hus- 
band his wife, because of those finer traits of person- 
ality which endear each to the other here. If, therefore, 
immortality is to be more than the survival after death 
of a mere spark of life, if the self-conscious personality 
survives at all, then it must be recognizable. 

Not only is this true, but it must of necessity also be 
true that we will know not less, but more in heaven. 
''Now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to 
face ; now we know in part, but then we shall know even 
as we are known.'' ''Beloved, now are we the sons of 
God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we 
know that we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him 
as He is.'' 

The limitations of the flesh hold us back here from 
the fullest knowledge of each other, but there, in that 
perfect spiritual realm, our exalted understandings shall 
know more perfectly than here we have ever known. 
We shall be able there to search the glorious depths of 
a m.other's love, and to reach up to the sublime heights 
of a little child's pure affection. We shall feel in its un- 
mixed power the glory of manly friendship one for the 
other. We shall not know less, but more, in the heavenly 
home, of the dear ones who have gone before. This 
leads to another thought. That is that 

TRUE LOVE IS ETERNAL 

The one thing that nothing upon this earth can de- 
stroy is a genuine love. It outlasts fire, and persecution, 
and sword, and miisunderstanding, and mistreatment, and 



240 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

betrayal itself. In one of the Greek tragedies vve have 
the beautiful picture of the parting between two lovers. 
The man is about to be led forth to execution, and his 
lover, clinging fondly to his neck, asks him at last through 
her tears, ''And shall we never see each other more?'' 
To which he replies : 

^'I have asked that awful question 
Of the hills that seem eternal; 
Of the rippling streams, 
That limpid flow forever: 
Of the stars, within whose azure fields 
My raised spirit hath walked in glory. 
All were dumb. 

But now, as I look into thy living face, 
I know that the love 
Wliich is shining through its beauty 
Can never wholly perish. 
Clemanthe, we shall meet again!" 

Now if love is to survive after the graA^e, then it must 
have an object on Avhich to lash its affection, which means, 
of course, that we will be able to recognize our loved 
ones there. 

A little child was sick unto death, and the broken- 
hearted mother said as she tried to soothe the little one : 
*^Oh, my dear, in a little while you will be in heaven, 
and you will see such wonderful sights there'.'' Then 
she pictured the golden streets, and the tree of life, and 
the glorious city, but the little one said : ''Oh, mother, 
I can't bear any sound ; I don't want to hear the music 
you have told me about. ]\Iy eyes hurt me so I can't 
see; and I don't want to see the glories of heaven!" And 
then the broken-hearted mother, folded her child to her 
bosom and wept out her heart, and the little one looked 
up and said: ''Alother, if heaven is like this, then I want 
^o go there !" 



WILL WE KNOW OUR LOVED ONES? 241 

And that is what heaven will be. It will be the fuU 
fruition of unchanging, pure, holy, and perfect love. 
This truth leads us to a solution also of another problem, 
and that is how w^e can find our loved ones in heaven. 
A dear mother who had lost a precious child asked me 
that question once with trembling lips. ''Oh/' she said, 
"when I think of the w^onder of heaven and the un- 
counted billions of the redeemed, I wonder how I shall 
ever find my precious, precious child.'' Then I pointed 
out to her that, even in this poor world of ours, every 
great city has its directory. Even men with their little 
care and little love liave had the wisdom and the power 
to so arrange it that when we go into a strange city, we 
can promptly and easily find our friends. And then I 
asked that sorrowing mother if she did not know God's 
wisdom was vastly greater than that of man, and that He 
must, therefore, make all necessary^ provision for those 
things : and I also pointed out to her the fact of affinity 
— that even in this world those that love are unfailingly 
and instinctively brought together. 

THE VOICE OF HISTORY 

Again, my dear friends, history's voice proves to us 
this great and blessed truth of heaven recognition. I 
mean by history, in this connection, the record that has 
been left by human experiences, and the faiths of men, 
for that, at last, is the essence of true history. I would 
point out in this connection that many great men have 
firmly believed this comforting truth. In addition to the 
quotations from secular literature already given, listen 
to the words of a few men. representing great groups of 
Christian believers. 

Cardinal Newman, the Roman Catholic, says in "Lead, 
Kindly Light" : 



242 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

^^The night is gone, 
And in the morn, those angel faces smile 
Which I have loved long since and lost awhile/' 

John Fawcett, the Baptist, in his ''Blest Be the Tie 
That Binds,'' exclaims : 

''When we asunder part, 
It gives us inward pain, 
But we shall still be joined in heart, 
And hope to meet again. 

''From sorrow, toil, and pain, 
And sin we shall be free. 
And perfect love and friendship reign 
Through all eternity/' 

Charles Wesley, the IMethodist, sings for us and with 
us: 

"Come, let us join our friends above 
That have obtained the prize, 
That on the eagle win^s of love 

To joys celestial rise; 
One family we dwell in Him, 

Though now divided by the stream, 
The narrow stream of death 
To jo3's celestial rise/" 

Bonar, the Presbyterian, tells of the land: 

"Where none shall beckon us away 

And bid our festival be done ; 
Our m^eeting time, the eternal day; 

Our meeting place, the eternal throne. 
Then hand in hand firm linked at last 

And heart enfolded all, 
We'll smile upon the troubled past 

And wonder why we wept at all." 



ii 



WILL WE KNOW OUR LOVED ONES? 243 

Muhlenberg, the EpiscopaHan, Hfting his gaze to the 
heavenly country, exultantly sings : 

**There the saints of all ages in harmony meet. 
Their Savior and kindred transported to greet, 
Where anthems of rapture unceasingly roll, 
And the smile of the Lord is the feast of the soul." 



Xot only, however, does literature and psychology- point 
in the direction of this great truth, but there are many 
instances of righteous men and women who just before 
death were allowed to look within the veil and to see 
the loved ones who had gone before. Paul testifies that 
he was lifted up into the third heaven. Stephen, the 
first Christian martyr, when he was being stoned to death 
saw the heavens open and Jesus receiving him up into 
glory. A short time ago, one of the noble wives and 
mothers of this church passed away. Her own mother 
had been dead for many years. The loved ones at her 
bedside were greatly surprised, just before the spirit left 
the flesh, to see her rally from the deep stupor in which 
she had been lying, suddenly sit up in bed and stretch 
out her arms as, with face aglow with heavenly radiance, 
she exclaimed: ''^lother! Mother!'' And immediately 
thereafter, she sank back upon her pillow and the spirit 
was gone from its earthly home. 

^\Iany of you have doubtless heard of the beautiful 
and remarkable scenes at the death bed of Dwight L. 
Moody. After lingering many weeks, he said softly one 
day, when his wife and his son \Mliiam were standing 
at his bedside : "Earth is receding, heaven is opening to 
me." Then as they v»'atched him, it seemxd, so they de- 
clared later, as though he passed over to the other side. 
They thought that he was dead, but by and by, he came 
back, and opening his eyes told them that he had been 



.244 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

in heaven. He said, '^I remember now, I have been in 
heaven, and I have seen Dwight and Irene." These were 
•his two Httle grandchildren whom- he loved very much. 
A little while after this, he closed his eyes, and fell asleep 
in Jesus, to be with the precious grandchildren, and the 
other loved ones who had gone before. 



THE ASSURANCE OF GOD S WORD 

Crowning it all, better than either intuition, reason, 
or human experience, as the ground of our faith and 
hope on this great issue, are the assurances of the Word 
of God. The Bible plainly teaches the fact not only of 
survival after death, but also the fact of recognition in 
the other world. In the Old Testament, even, we have 
foregleams of this truth. There, for example, is the 
touching story of the death of David's baby. The King, 
in sackcloth and ashes, had refused food, and lain day 
after day prone upon his face, praying for the sick baby. 
At last the servants came into the presence of the King, 
afraid to tell him the sad news that the baby was dead; 
but David discerned this, and when he received from 
them the confift'mation of the fact, they were amazed' to 
see him dismiss his grief and arise, change his cloihing, 
and call for food. But he answered their surprise by 
saying to them that while the child yet lived- he prayed, 
hoping that perchance God might spare him, but now 
that the child was dead there was no use praying, and 
then he added this significant sentence : ''He cannot come 
to me, but I will go to him." 

The New Testatment is as clear as the light of day on 
this teaching. Here Jesus is with Peter, James, and 
John, praying upon the mountainside. Suddenly He is 
transfigured before them, so that His face shines with 
divine radiance, and even His garments become white 



^\ 



WILL WE KNOW OUR LOVED ONES? 245 

and glistening. The disciples look up in startled amaze- 
ment and see not only Jesus, in His transfiguration glory, 
but they see also, two others, Elijah and Moses; and I 
want you .to notice, my dear friends, that these visitors 
were recognizable to the disciples. Peter exclaimed, 
*'Lord, it is good for us to be here. Let us make here 
three tabernacles, one for Thee, one for Moses, and one 
for Elijah." Elijah was Elijah, Moses was Moses, and 
although they ha(d* passed away from earth hundreds of 
years before, they came back as God's messengers from 
the spirit world; to prepare Christ for His approaching 
crucifixion and death, and to assure Him of the continued 
favor of the Heavenly Father; and on that visit to the 
scenes of earth, through the quickening power of the 
presence of Christ, they were recognized by even the dull 
eyes of the disciples. 

But we have better proof still. We have an actual 
fact of history recorded where one who had been dead 
not only was raised again, but was recognized by those 
who had known him before death. Mary, with a 
w^oman's constancy and a woman's measureless love, had 
gone to the tomb that Sabbath morning before the break- 
ing of the day, to lay there some flowery tribute of affec- 
tion and to bedew the cold stones with the jewels of her 
tears. B^ut when she came, she found the stone rolled 
away, and the body of Jesus, as she supposed, stolen; 
and then- she saw Jesus Himself standing beside the open 
tomb. In her fright and excitement, she took Him to 
be the gardener, and exclaimed, *Sir, if you have taken 
Him away, show me where you have laid Him!" Then 
Jesus, looking at her, said no w^ord except to call her 
nam.e — ''Mary!" and instantly, like a full tide of joy, 
recognition rushes over her. The soft intonation and 
well known inflection of His voice, freighted with the 
tenderness of His devotion, was there, and as she heard 



246 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

her name thus called, she recognized the risen Lord and 
exclaimed, ''Raboni! Master!'' 



NO "spiritualism" 

Oh, my dear friends, if we could fully understand, we 
would see that the veil between heaven and earth is very 
thin, at last. I do not believe in spiritualism. I believe 
that we ought to heed the warnings of God's Word not 
to allow ourselves to dwell too much on these matters; 
and certainly we ought not to brood over them, or seek 
any earth-born means to communicate with our loved 
ones. The Bible explicitly warns us against doing this, 
and I have known cases of added sorrow to come from 
such efforts, where reason almost tottered upon its throne 
because of too much dwelling upon these things. God 
has told us enough to strengthen our faith, and to give 
a firm foundation for our hope, and we ought to leave 
the whole matter there, just where He leaves it. 

But I do think that heaven is not far away, and our 
dear ones are nearer, day by day, perhaps, even than 
we have ever dreamed. If these dull eyes were but a 
little finer, we could see the beauty of that better land, 
and if our ears were but attuned to them, we could hear 
the very harmonies of heaven. 

Now this is precisely the assurance that our text and 
Scripture lesson here in Thessalonians give to us. 
Some of those who lived in Paul's day were troubled 
over his teaching of the second coming of the Lord, for 
they were afraid that, when they were taken, they would 
leave their loved one behind. But Paul corrects this 
impression. He tells them that if Jesus comes while they 
are yet living, the dead who sleep in Jesus will be raised 
first, their loved ones will be brought back, and they 
themselves will be changed, and together they will be 



WILL WE KNOW OUR LOVED ONES? 247 

caught up to meet the Lord in the air, to be ^'forever 
with the Lord." Wherefore, He says, ''Comfort one 
another with these words'' ; and surely, my dear friends, 
this blessed truth is comforting. 

Death to the Christian is not the end, but the begin- 
ning of life. It is not the day of doom, but the day of 
deliverance. It is not the time of trial, but the time of 
triumph. Death to the Christian is but an incident in 
his everlasting life. It is only a mile-post on the high- 
way of eternity. It is simply a door dividing this world, 
with its blended suffering and joys, sunlight and shadows, 
with its limitations and imperfections, from that perfect 
w^orld, whose joys are unmixed, whose experiences are 
unlimited and perfect, and whose beauty is flawless for- 
evermore. 

There is a beautiful legend which tells of a saint of 
the olden time, who dreamed that death came to him as 
he lay on his couch. AVhen first he saw the visitor he 
struck terror to his soul, for he came in the dark garb 
of a monk; in his hand the scythe was held, and be- 
neath the cowl a skeleton grinned. But, as he looked 
longer, behold \ the dark habiliments began to melt away 
in glowing light; the scythe was transformed into a palm 
of victory; the skeleton vanished into air, and in its 
place stood a beautful angel, robed in resplendent glory 
and smiling with joy, as he said to the saint, ''Oh, child 
of God, I am Death. You see me in your human fears 
as a dark and terrible foe, but in reality I am thy friend, 
and I come as God's messenger to lead thee home.'' 

''When the evening shadows gather^ 
And the long day's work is done, 
When we reach that unknown country. 
Out beyond the setting sun. 



248 THE GARDENS OF LIFE 

After all the weary waiting, 
In their peaceful rest to share, 
No more need of anguished parting, 
We shall know each other there. 

^'Cherished forms who walked beside us 
Down the long, eventful years, 
How wt w^atched them as they vanished 
Through a mist of falling tears; 
Loving voices hushed in silence, 
Joining with the angel band, 
Singing their triumphant anthems, 
Over in the Beulah land. 

*^Hush, then, each rebellious murmur, 
For we, too, are going home 
Going to find our household treasures, 
When our feet shall cease to roam ; 
On the resurrection morning. 
Free from pain and free from care, 
With our tear-dimmed eyes made perfect. 
We shall know each other there/' 













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